A century ago, Lord Macaulay had expressed a fine desire on observing us: “We must at present do our best to form a class who may be interpreters between us and the millions whom we govern; a class of persons, Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals, and in intellect.” Macaulay’s farsightedness must be commended, for why else should the resolve of 1833 take the form that it has today in India, and particularly in West Bengal? It is not only in economic matters that we have been deprived of our rights, but we are also paying for our sins by depending on others to assist us and tell us what is to be done. The prowess we have demonstrated in imitating the behaviour and the attire of the ruling race can make the people of other provinces serve as our apprentices for years to come. When the first Bengali barrister at the high court began his practice, he took up residence in the Chowringhee area, which can be described as the West End of Calcutta. His drawing room was done up in the English manner, and in his customs and manners, he soon became a white man. The Bar Library is the font of these newfangled habits, and from there it has spread like an infectious disease to the lowest rungs of educated and half-educated society. Whatever flourishes are to be seen today among so-called cultured people will be accepted eagerly two days later by people at large.
It would be no exaggeration to call Bengal a mine of tobacco. An excellent quality of tobacco is cultivated in Rangpur and Cooch Behar. Unfortunately, the market is full of foreign cigarettes, and people are abandoning Indian tobacco to lean towards these imported products. From the beggar on the streets to the peasant in the field, no one is willing to consume tobacco with the help of the traditional hookah anymore. The cultivation of local tobacco is dwindling as a result.
Simultaneously, after flooding, in turn, the upper and middle strata of society, another bad habit has descended to the lowest one, to spread among the general public. It was at an unfortunate moment that Lord Curzon, the high priest of the administration and oppressive policies of imperialism, offered advice to this effect to the European Tea Association: you have engaged yourself in publicising Indian tea in Europe and America at great expense, but a wide expanse lies open in front of your very eyes. Cultivating it well can lead to a bountiful harvest – you do not have to travel long distances.
Not contenting himself only with dispensing his counsel to the tea association, he also imposed a tax on the export of tea to further his objective, which led to a collection of Rs 13–14 lakh, most of which he handed over to the association, after which a robust publicity drive was undertaken with this money, and one only has to run one’s eyes across the newspaper columns to realize that the abovementioned publicity continues to be undertaken with great enthusiasm. As an example, I present a short excerpt from an advertisement:
“The source of vitality and energy, exterminator of malaria – Indian tea. Indian tea can be used whenever necessary to invigorate the mind and the body, bringing indescribable comfort. After a long day of physical work or mental activity, a cup of finely brewed Indian tea will bring joy to both the body and the mind. Tea is indeed a living storehouse of vigour. Make it a rule to drink at least two cups of the best Indian tea every morning, and all weariness will be dispelled, you will be in excellent health all day, and then drink two cups of tea again in the evening – there will be no interruptions to your pleasant rest after a hard day’s toil….” etc etc.
From the money gained from the abovementioned tax, tea shops were opened on the principal avenues of Calcutta, such as those at the Bowbazar and Thonthonia crossroads, and cups of tea as well as one paisa’s worth of tea leaves in small packages were distributed generously from these establishments. Once this inducement enabled the people to be attracted to tea, the next step was to offer the bait. It took no time for everyone to bite, not just the educated sections of society but also porters and labourers and coachmen – no one was left out. It was not limited to Calcutta, small shops for selling tea were opened in the large railway stations all over India, village fairs and markets to entice the ignorant public. The tea association recently sent out a fleet of boats across East Bengal, where rivers abound, and Bengal’s villages now resound with cries of admiration for tea.
It is true that there might be some requirement for drinking tea in cold climes, but it has no value in our warm land. When white men and women drink tea, it is accompanied by many items of nutritious food, but the poorly paid, emaciated clerks of Bombay and Calcutta and other cities meet their requirements for both food and drink with tea. Within an hour or two of going to their offices, they are overcome by the desire for some tea. A cup of tea during their gruelling work provides them with some temporary relief, energy, and elation. Then they go back to their tedious, backbreaking labour, interspersed with sips of tea – such is the daily life of the clerk. In this way they consume some five or six cups of tea during an entire day. The clerk defends this unhealthy practice with the argument that it kills the appetite, making expensive, nutritious food unnecessary.
I shall demonstrate that drinking tea is harmful from the perspective not only of the medical sciences and the health sciences, but also of economics. 96% of the tea produced in Bengal comes from estates owned by the British. Only the remaining 4 per cent is grown in gardens with Bengali or Assamese owners. If the habit of drinking tea spreads among all the people as quickly as at present, even assuming a minimum annual expenditure of Re 1 per head on tea, foreigners will pocket 5 crore every year from Bengal’s population of 5 crore people. It is true that a small proportion of this sum will go to tea estate labourers as compensation, but alas, these labourers are not Bengali either.
I have already mentioned the efforts of the Tea Association to increase the sales of tea. The methods employed for publicity cannot be supported in any manner on moral grounds. Ignorant and simple-minded peasants are the primary prey of these hunting expeditions. Endless efforts are being made to arouse an artificial and unhealthy taste and craving in them, in some places this is even done with the help of the bioscope. Hyperbole, overstatements, and prevarication are the fundamental methods. The tea market in Europe is in recession, which is why the Tea Association is desperate to compensate for it by holding the poisoned chalice of tea to the lips of the public.
Five or six crore hungry people, for whom starvation and poverty are constant companions, who do not know what it means to eat their fill – but what difference does that make? The avaricious self-seeking wealthy class of traders do not hold back from adopting any base method or means of deception whatsoever to fulfil their own objective. They do not lack for enthusiasm when it comes to enrapturing the wretched in a spider’s web of false persuasion; encomiums to tea are sung loudly – “prevents malaria, infallible cure for croup”, and so much more. Five years ago, I had been to a pharmaceutical factory in Germany when travelling there; I saw cocaine being prepared in enormous quantities. Cocaine is manufactured the same way in Japan and elsewhere, but where does it all go, what purpose does it serve? Only a minuscule portion of the cocaine produced in the world is used in medicines meant to cure ailments; the rest of it is used for consumption as a narcotic. The efforts initiated by the League of Nations to mitigate the misuse of this dangerous drug are undoubtedly commendable, but, thumbing their nose at the league’s rules and regulations, the perpetrators continue manufacturing cocaine illegally and trading in it secretly without hindrance. Even if referring to cocaine seems irrelevant in the matter of tea, the two have something in common – the same disgraceful story lies at the root of both: of the flames of avarice of a handful of heartless traders, and the moth-like self-immolation in these flames of the foolish and silent public. The opinion of medical practitioners on the harm that tea and coffee do to good health is unambiguous. I shall quote some of them one by one. Among them the statement of the finest of physicians, Naliniranjan Sengupta, MD, is particularly deserving of consideration. He says, “From time immemorial in Bengal the rich and the poor alike have eaten gur–chhola, aada–chhola, chhola–muri, rice with starch, or milk – depending on their respective means – for breakfast. Whether for their nutritional benefits or as sources of vitamins, these foods are incomparable. If a little butter and sugar or chhana can be added, that will be perfect.”
In order to fulfil their own objectives, the Indian Tea Association embarked on an extensive mission more than 30 years ago to inculcate the habit of drinking tea among Indians. Even if our poor countrymen could get something to eat every day, the luxury of tea was beyond their means; therefore, they would have to choose one – tea or food. This led to the transformation of tea from beverage to food. When this conspiracy and the attendant publicity were underway to sway our countrymen from their age-old customs, there was no one to warn them, and even the health department in the country was indifferent to the matter. If there is anything beneficial by way of food in tea, it is in the milk, but there are great doubts about the purity of this milk. For 30 full years, the Tea Association has been working against your interest to conduct an unchecked mission to change our country’s age-old practices of food-selection, and, spellbound by their enticement, innocent Indians consume this poisonous beverage without the slightest suspicion, sacrificing their health and well-being in the process.
Dr L Walter Carr, MD, FRCS, London, says, “Tea and coffee agitate the heart and the nerves, even perfectly brewed tea, if drunk in excessive quantities, can lead to ailments like indigestion, nervous disorder, palpitation, vertigo, and so on. Consuming tea instead of food, or drinking tea or coffee to get rid of the fatigue arising from hard work, or artificially stimulating the brain when it requires rest – all of these are perilous practices.” Some time ago, the British Medical Association held a session in Winnipeg, where Dr WF Dixon of Cambridge gave a lecture on narcotics addiction. In the course of presenting a comparative description of various stimulators, he said, “Of all the causes of nervous disorders, the use of the narcotic named caffeine is widespread. Caffeine is present in tea and coffee. One cup of tea consists of more than one grain of caffeine, therefore every tea-drinker consumes between five and eight grains of caffeine a day; this is not a negligible quantity. Drinking tea lowers digestive power – this is known as tea dyspepsia. Excessive consumption of tea leads to acidity, colic, constipation, insomnia, loss of appetite, and malfunctions of the heart.”
According to Dr John Fisher, although tea stimulates the drinker initially, later it leads to tiredness; to get rid of this, it is necessary to drink more tea; in this manner, the repetition of stimulation and exhaustion gradually worsens the condition of the tea drinker. Indigestion, insomnia, anaemia, constipation, and, in some cases, alcoholism and even insanity may be the outcome. Dr J Betituke says it is difficult to determine which of the two is more dangerous, a pot of tea or a bottle of whisky.
Excerpted with permission from ‘The Spread of Tea and the Ruin of the Nation’ by Prafulla Chandra Ray in The Bengal Reader: The Finest Fiction, Non-Fiction, Poetry, and Plays from the Bengali, edited and translated by Arunava Sinha.
Disclosure: Arunava Sinha is the editor of the Books and Ideas section of Scroll.
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