Collectors of tea - black&white

This is my entry for #monomad challenge by @monochromes

here fourth and last post about tea collector in Assam province, between Dibrugarh and Nagaland province, north east India.
Today black and white pictures.

"The worst suffering of the tea garden communities under the colonial regime has hardly improved in the post independence period in spite of the enactment of the Plantation Labour Act, 1951 which was supposed to address the problems of the tea garden people. The tea gardens are still waiting the basic facilities in terms of health, sanitation and education. The complex web of service conditions under which these groups people are compelled to work shows the failure of the state to fulfill its basic responsibilities. The social exclusion of the tea garden community is apparent in the contexts of the abysmal condition of health and sanitation of majority of these people. They still suffer from illiteracy, high rate of malnutrition, female mortality etc. Most of the tea garden women suffer from poor nutrition and this explains why most of the women are anaemic. According to a UNICEF sample survey, 95% of tea garden women are anaemic. Child marriage is also rampant among the tea garden people which also explain the health status of the women at the later stage of their lives. They also suffer from superstitious practices such as witch hunting which are still visible in the tea garden areas." (from “Stories Behind a Hot Cup of Assam Tea: Listening to the Voices of Women Labourers in the Tea Gardens”, sponsored by the Ministry of Women and Child Development, Government of India, year 2017)

Pictures taken with Nikon D800 and Sony Alpha 7iii cameras, february 2020.