HAILAKANDI, Dec 12 - Towards strengthening the Digital India move initiated by the Central Government, South Assam�s Hailakandi district today attained cent per cent success in opening bank accounts of its tea garden workers.
All the 17 tea estates have completed the process of opening bank accounts of individual tea garden workers. District Labour Officer Alimuddin Barbhuiya informed that of the 16,327 permanent and temporary workers, 15,668 have already opened bank accounts, while the rest 659 workers, who did not turn up, are mostly seasonal ones.
�All the 17 tea garden managements have declared that the process of opening of bank accounts of their workers has been completed. Around 659 workers, who did not turn up, are mostly seasonal workers. If these workers turn up at any time, the managements will facilitate the opening of their bank accounts too, " said Barbhuiya, adding that hardly any worker turned up at the Customer Service Providers (CSPs) situated in and around the tea estates during the past couple of days.
After Burnie Braes, payment of wages through workers� bank accounts has begun in three divisions of Aenakhal Tea Estate much before the deadline of December 15, informed Barbhuiya.
The District Labour Officer said that though bank account opening in all the tea estates have been completed, the real challenge lies in making payments through CSPs on account of few numbers of CSPs and poor network connectivity in 12 out of 17 gardens.
Added to this is the inability on the part of the designated banks to generate account numbers resulting in delay in payments through the accounts, said Barbhuiya. He further said that under the directive of Deputy Commissioner Moloy Bora, he has been closely monitoring the process to ensure that not a single tea garden worker is left out of the mammoth exercise.