Assam has also decided to reserve 10 per cent seats in government colleges. (Representational)
In a first, Assam is coming up with more than 100 high schools at tea gardens across the state to improve literacy and control dropout rate within the tea garden labour community, the state government has said.
It has been billed as "one of the biggest education infrastructure creation in the tea estates of Assam in post-independence era."
"The state government on November 1 will start construction of 104 high schools across the state," Assam Education Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma today.
The ruling Bharatiya Janata Party has reached out to a sizeable tea tribe community of Assam with the promise of developing educational infrastructure in tea gardens, ahead of next year's assembly election.
Addressing the party's tea tribe wing meeting in Jorhat, Mr Sarma said that it is time to recognize the tea tribe as "proud Assamese".
"Each school would cost around Rs 1.50 crore and in total, the state government would be spending Rs 300 crore on this project. We want to empower the tea tribe," Mr Sarma added.
The state government has also decided to reserve 10 per cent seats in government colleges in tea garden belts of the state, he said.
"It felt bad to see that after over 70 years of Independence, inside the tea gardens, in the labour lines, there were no roads, no high schools. Women folk did not have bank accounts. Now over 7 lakhs tea garden workers have been brought under financial inclusion through Jan Dhan accounts," Mr Sarma had said earlier.