Indian Tea Culture - East India Company

East India Company

In the early 1820s, the British East India Company began large-scale production of tea in Assam, India, of a tea variety traditionally brewed by the Singpho tribe. In 1826, the British East India Company took over the region from the Ahom kings through the Yandaboo Treaty. In 1837, the first English tea garden was established at Chabua in Upper Assam; in 1840, the Assam Tea Company began the commercial production of tea in the region, run by indentured servitude of the local inhabitants. Beginning in the 1850s, the tea industry rapidly expanded, consuming vast tracts of land for tea plantations. By the start of the 20th century, Assam became the leading tea producing region in the world. But despite the discovery of the indigenous Camellia Sinensis plant, the tea industry in India began with 42,000 seedlings germinated from a consignment of 80,000 seeds procured from China – 2000 were planted in the hill districts of South India, and 20,000 each in the hill districts in Kumaon in North India and Upper Assam on the north east frontier. It was only later that the indigenous plants were used. Today, the Chinese strain produces Darjeeling tea and the indigenous Assamese variety produces the remainder of the tea produced in India.

Writing in The Cambridge World History of Food (Kiple & Ornelas 2000:715–716), Weisburger & Comer write:

The tea cultivation begun there in the nineteenth century by the British, however, has accelerated to the point that today India is listed as the world's leading producer, its 715, 000 tons well ahead of China's 540, 000 tons, and of course, the teas of Assam, Ceylon (from the island nation known as Sri Lanka), and Darjeeling are world famous. However, because Indians average half a cup daily on per capita basis, fully 70 percent of India's immense crop is consumed locally.