BIDI INDUSTRY
Smoked Out

Faced with a declining market, labour problems and diminishing political clout, Madhya Pradesh's bidi barons are moving out in search of greener pastures.

By Bharat Desai

Fridays are smoking days for Baburao Pimplapure. As he settles down with a heap of bidis before him in the study of his sprawling mansion in Sagar, the 65-year-old winces as his lungs -- which remain smoke-free for the remaining six days of the week -- take a pounding. An hour later, with two dozen bidis reduced to ashes, he arrives at the right blend of tobacco for No. 207, the favourite bidi of nearly 15 lakh smokers in the country. But it's not just the mixture of tar and nicotine that leaves a bad taste in Pimplapure's mouth after the routine he has been religiously following every week for the last 30 years. Business hasn't exactly been on fire for him or the other bidi barons of Madhya Pradesh, which accounted for nearly half the country's production of bidis till some years ago. Faced with a declining market, labour problems and diminishing political clout, more and more manufacturers are now moving out of the state in search of greener pastures and greater returns.

"Almost 30 per cent of the business has already shifted out," says Pimplapure, who is also president of the Madhya Pradesh Bidi Manufacturers' Association. The new destinations are the poor pockets of West Bengal, Bihar, Orissa, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, where labour is cheaper and workmanship of a better grade. The absence of plants and machinery has made the shifting easy. The migration recently forced Chief Minister Digvijay Singh to press the Central Government to formulate a national policy and wage structure for the bidi industry, a long-standing demand of the unions representing 20 lakh workers in the state.

The exodus began in 1989 when the then chief minister Arjun Singh announced the nationalisation of tendu leaf collection. As a consequence, the price of the leaves shot up from Rs 5 to Rs 30 per kg. It picked up momentum last year after the state Government directed that the workers be paid Dearness Allowance (DA) at the rate of 2 paise per point, taking their wages to Rs 30 for every 1,000 bidis rolled. But the manufacturers contended that this would push up the total cost of rolling 1,000 bidis to Rs 82.45, as against Rs 65.97 in West Bengal, Rs 64.22 in Bihar and Rs 58.22 in Orissa. The DA was then reduced to 1 paisa a point only to be legally challenged by the bidi workers.

The issue is pending before the Madhya Pradesh High Court, but even so manufacturers say the operational costs in the state are so high that it is cheaper to transport raw material to other states and get the bidis rolled there. The slimmer, finer bidis from the south and east have overtaken sales of those produced by adopting conventional methods in Madhya Pradesh's Bundelkhand belt comprising Sagar, Damoh and Jabalpur districts. Last year, the annual bidi production in the state fell to 5,200 crore from a peak of 7,700 crore in 1984. Even popular brands like No. 207 have been hit -- its daily production is down to 2 crore from 3.5 crore a decade ago.

The declining market, according to manufacturers, is largely because of the changing smoking habits in the countryside -- whether it is greater awareness about health or simply a growing preference for cigarettes and paan masala. Added to this, the collection of tendu leaves in the state, which accounts for nearly 60 per cent of the country's supply, was rather low at 40 lakh bags before the monsoon broke out. Over the past three months, manufacturers and traders have boycotted auctions of the leaves in Bhopal, alleging that the bags contain much less than the stipulated 1,000 bundles of 50 leaves each.

Though the total expenditure incurred in wages paid to leaf pluckers has jumped from Rs 50 crore in 1988 (before nationalisation) to Rs 150 crore today, the collection of leaves in the same period has dropped by a third. The quality too has deteriorated. "There is mismanagement and corruption at every level of collection," says Siddharthbhai Patel, manufacturer of Sher brand bidis.

A decade ago, summers were the busiest season for the manufacturers and tendu contractors. Recalls Anilbhai Patel, manufacturer of the Phool Chaap brand: "When everybody else was holidaying, we used to slog it out in the sun." But post-nationalisation, things have changed. With the collection of leaves done by pluckers' cooperatives, says Patel, "we can all go to hill stations during summers now".

Some even take vacations abroad. Many believe that it is the craving for a lavish lifestyle, in sharp contrast to the abject poverty of the bidi rollers, that has been the undoing of the barons. Manufacturer and former minister Vitthalbhai Patel candidly says, "We haven't given the workers their due and some of us have adopted questionable means of making money." Over the years, the sullied image has cost the barons their political power as well. The money-fed bidi lobby was once strong enough to block the entry of any large industry into Bundelkhand in order to perpetuate the dependence of the region's poor on bidi manufacturers. It's no coincidence that three treasurers of the Madhya Pradesh Congress Committee -- Parmanandbhai Patel, Dal-chand Jain and Arvindbhai Patel -- have been bidi bigwigs.

While not a politician himself, Pimplapure recalls, "Many politicians used to come to my father Chintamanrao for donations, and tickets to contest elections were there for the asking." Successive barons have also been MPs, MLAs and ministers. But today, barring the lone representative in the state Assembly, Sunil Jain, they have little political reckoning. No wonder Jain says, "Business is on the decline and so our political clout too has declined."

Despite these realities, the bidi manufacturers continue to live in palatial bungalows, littered with fleets of Honda Accords and Civics, Contessas and Cielos. Marriages are grand events with lavish gifts being showered upon guests. Those who have been in the bidi business for the last five decades are worth anywhere between Rs 50 crore and Rs 100 crore each. One baron smokes an Indian Lights cigarette, though with a Japanese filter which reduces the tar content to a fraction of what his bidi contains. In fact, some of them like Pimplapure and Vitthalbhai Patel openly admit that there is a stigma attached to making bidis. They say that they are "distinctly uncomfortable in the industry". It is an exploitative industry where there is little supervision, child labour difficult to eliminate and the end-product proven injurious to health.

But guilt pangs don't make business sense. Especially if it's a business that has helped roll megabucks for almost half a century. Union leader Ajit Jain sees the flight of bidi capital as just a means by which the barons are blackmailing the Government to provide incentives to the industry, so they can continue to make money.

The point is not so much the declining fortunes of the barons -- that's something they are already setting right in their new-found bidi bases, even diversifying into areas like finance, real estate and agriculture -- as the plight of the lakhs of bidi workers they are leaving behind. Arvindbhai Patel, who makes the mass-selling No. 27 brand, may tell you that he "dreads the day the bidi industry will bid a final good-bye to Bundelkhand, where people have no other means of livelihood". But ask him what he plans to do about it, and the question draws a blank, for he has himself shifted base.

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