"Centre to repeal Tea Act of 1953 and Coffee Act of 1942", 11 January 2021

The Narendra Modi government has decided to dump the decades-old legislation that has governed major cash crops like tea and coffee and introduce new legislation designed to reconstitute the relevant Boards that will henceforth act as “facilitators” for the benefit of the industry.

The Centre has proposed to repeal the Tea Act of 1953 and the Coffee Act of 1942 and replace them with new regulations.

The government has placed the new proposals in the public domain and sought suggestions and comments from the stakeholders on the proposed regulations...

The new legislation – to be called the Tea (Promotion and Development) Act, 2022 -- proposes to delete those archaic provisions which have become irrelevant in today’s context and introduce new objectives/functions/powers of the Board so that the Board can act as a facilitator to optimise the development, promotion and research in tea industry and help in improving production, export, quality of Indian tea, the notice added.

The Coffee Board also put up the proposals on its website and sought comments.

Sources said the Centre may carry out similar changes in other commodity boards such as rubber, spice shortly. These commodity specific boards, with strong regional presence and connection, report to the Union ministry of commerce...