Backstory: Driving to ‘where no cars can go’ in the Darjeeling mountains

It was late May and I was in Darjeeling district of West Bengal interviewing tea estate managers and workers about the struggles their world famous industry was facing due to climate change and competition.

On my first day there I had joined protesting activists and workers at Longview tea estate at 7 am for interviews. I thought that would take up most of the day but by 10 am the protest had wrapped up and the workers returned to work.

The day was still young and I was eager to visit more tea estates, so I asked activists from the Hill Plantation Employees Union to recommend a place. They suggested that I visit Ringtong tea estate and meet Sudha Tamang, a member of their executive committee, who was also a tea estate worker.

Google Maps showed that the tea estate was close to Darjeeling city, a 30-kilometre uphill drive from Longview that would take about an hour and a half. I was staying in Silliguri and the driver who had accompanied me from there appeared a little displeased about our new destination, but after bragging about his driving skills on the steep hills we set forth.

About two hours later, passing through misty roads with breathtaking scenery and dangerously steep roads, we arrived close to Ringtong where another activist, Sumit, was supposed to meet us.

“The tea estate is quite deep in the interiors. Come to my house and then we’ll set off from there on foot,” Sumit said and sent me a location on WhatsApp. The location led us down a small road whose condition worsened as we progressed.

After five minutes of driving through a string of hairpin bends, I gasped when I saw that the road ahead was even more steep. By then the driver had begun grumbling about “locals in the hills” who would call you to places “where no cars can reach”. As we went down the road and turned, we stopped abruptly as there was a small queue of vehicles waiting mid-slope. On asking what was wrong, someone nonchalantly said, “road bana rahe hai” – the road is being made.

After about half an hour of waiting, during which the car slightly slipped a few times, a mini road-roller went by. The road was finally freed up!

We drove down into more hairpin bends while I held on to the grab handles as we were flung from one side to another. Finally, we reached the bottom of the sloping road but the map audio location indicated that we had to go further ahead. Before us lay a stretch riddled with potholes. “I doubt any cars go there,” said the driver out aloud as two locals walked by and smiled. “No, no cars do go there,” they said.

As we continued further, the wheels screeched and I could suddenly smell smoke. “The engine has gotten too hot, we shouldn’t go any further, it's not safe,” said the driver. While we discussed what to do, it began drizzling and I finally gave up. We drove back up the steep road at breakneck speed to avoid being pulled down by gravity.

“We’re lucky we didn’t meet a car coming from the other way or it would have been disastrous,” said the driver. Tired and hungry, we stopped at a momo stall for lunch.

I called Sumit and asked him to come meet me on foot or a two-wheeler. Thirty minutes later he arrived. “The road is not that bad, there are worse roads in these hills,” he said with a smile as the driver rolled his eyes.

Yet, somehow Sumit convinced the driver to drop us “thoda aagey” – a little further – down the same sloping road. Down we went again and Sumit kept repeating “bas thoda aagey” until we reached the bottom of the sloping road. He was not done.

“If you keep your car here, it won’t be safe. Drive down a little further and you can keep it in my friend’s backyard,” he told the driver. We went down the terrible road, which was awful to drive on but not as steep. As soon as we parked at Sumit’s friend’s backyard, the driver extended his seat and settled in for a nap.

“You should have gotten a driver from the hills,” Sumit told me.

Sumit and I walked for about an hour in the rain, first downhill and then uphill. At one point, as we were walking through a hill covered in tea plants, I slipped and fell, not too ungracefully, on my butt. I was not hurt, but I sat down for a bit, taking the moment to pause and take in the view. Sumit took out some churrpi – traditional cheese made from yak milk in the region – and we both munched on some. These roads are difficult for outsiders to traverse but we use them everyday so we don’t realise they’re tough, he said.

With all the back and forth it took me almost six hours to reach Tamang’s house, but it led to an excellent interview and was worth the perilous journey.