The Tea Board has taken unprecedented action by suspending all five auctioneers, two warehouses, and five tea manufacturers involved in the Coonoor tea auctions for anomalies found in the sampling of teas meant for auction. The specific durations of suspension are one week for the auctioneers, 14 days for the warehouses, and one month for the tea manufacturers. This decision follows the discovery that samples for auction No. 6 were drawn from non-existent (fictitious) lots, as the physical stocks or tea bags were neither present in the warehouse nor had been dispatched from the factories.
Coonoor is significant in India's tea trade, being the second-largest tea trading centre after Kolkata, with a system that primarily serves the domestic market. The Tea Board's enforcement of Bharat Auction rules highlights the requirement for auctioneers to both draw samples from lots post-cataloguing and conduct inspections of each lot they are responsible for selling.
This series of suspensions could potentially disrupt the sales process, at least temporarily, due to the integral role these auctioneers and entities play in the tea auction system. The practice under scrutiny has been ongoing for 60 years, with Coonoor being unique for its quick turnaround from catalogue closing to sale, a feature not seen in other Indian tea auction centers. The current situation raises concerns about the impact on the quality of stored teas, financial flows within the industry, and timely payments to small tea growers. Moreover, the future scheduling of auctions and the continuation of essential processes like cataloguing, sampling, and tea deliveries are in jeopardy, which could have a cascading effect on the broader tea trade.