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CHAPTER XXI.
based on the one-anna unit and in the case of plucking on the one-pice
unit. Whichever system is taken into account, the consideration of
wages resolves itself into the consideration of piece earnings. * The periods
of wage payment vary in different gardens; some pay weekly, some
monthly and a few daily. Where wages are paid monthly, payment
is usually made within 10 days of the completion of the month for which
wages are due. A fact which must strike every visitor to the Assam
plantations is that comparatively high average earnings do not necessa-
rily mean greater contentment among the labour force ; and we visited
some gardens in which, though the average earnings were compa-
ratively low, the workers appeared to be happy and contented. The
explanation is that the actual cash earnings of the worker do not repre-
sent his total remuneration, and that an important element in the attrac-
tions of a garden is frequently the value of the ‘ concessions ’ offered in
addition to the cash wage. It is necessary, therefore, to consider the
nature and extent of these concessions before we proceed to the examina-
sion of the level of cash wages.
Land for Private Cultivation.
Practically every garden worker receives free housing, medical
facilities and firewood, and many are given free grazing for cattle and
tand for cultivation, either free or at an uneconomic rent. To these
must be added the grant of advances without interest, and in a few
cases the issue of rice at concession rates. We deal later with housing,
medical facilities and maternity benefits. Of the others, the conces-
sion to which the worker attaches most importance is the grant of
land for private cultivation. The garden worker is essentially an
agriculturalist, and his desire for the possession of a holding which he
can cultivate with the help of the members of his family is great.
This ambition for private land, if fully satisfied, would remove all
desire for garden work, and in the allotment of garden land for private
sultivation the planter has, therefore, to study his own interests as well
as those of the worker. Hence the worker who desires and is able to set
up as an independent cultivator has to move to Government land outside
the garden, and private cultivation within the garden is confined to those
families which can provide labour on the garden. The extent of this con-
cession can be judged from the fact that in 1929 nearly 150,000 acres of land
were held by garden workers as tenants of the garden proprietors. This
represents about a quarter of an acre for each adult labourer living in garden
lines; and, as the rent charged is substantially below the real economic
rent, the value of the concession is undoubted. But all gardens are not
favourably situated in respect of the amount of land available for culti-
vation by their workers. In most gardens the acreage which can be
distributed among the workers is limited, and few gardens can offer a
holding of any size to the majority of the workers. Further, in the ab-
sence of any tenancy law applicable to the garden grants, the enjoyment
of this concession is entirely at the discretion of the garden manager.
Strictly speaking, the worker has a right only to the crop which he has

sown and can be evicted from his holding, even though he mav have