The hon. members who have spoken before said that the small growers get the correct price from the Board This is not so. The entire bulk of the profits they make in the home market and in the foreign market is kept by the bigger growers who dominate this Coffee Board. The price they get is more than what they pay to the small growers. That is the complaint of the small growers. So, it is not correct to say that the profits this Board makes are equally distributed to the small growers. Hence, the conflict between the big growers and the small growers is increasing. Therefore, it is necessary on the part of the Government to do justice to the small growers. The Government thinks that by taking powers for nominating the President of the Board, it is able to do justice to the small growers. The number of the small growers is 34,000, while the number of the big growers is 590. Most of the seats reserved for the growers in the last Board were monopolised by the big growers. The majority of the seats were held by the big growers; and the number of seats the small growers got was very meagre. It was not more than four, if my recollection is correct. What the Government should have done was to give equal representation to the small growers. They should have asked the growers to return their representatives or to give a panel of names from which Government could have chosen some. The choice of the representatives should have been left to the respective organisations. If there was no organisation for the small growers, Government should have asked them to organise one separately and then send in their representatives. Our friends said that the representatives of the small growers were there on the existing Board. It is true but I know the practice of these big growers or big industrialists. Having given membership to the smaller fry on their organisations, they don’t allow them to express themselves. The Chairman or the man who holds sway of the Board sees to it that all the members agree to what he dictates. That is the practice in these associations. We know that. So, it is better to have a separate organisation for the small growers and ask them to submit their panel of names to represent them on the Board. Representation on the Board should not be governed by the number of acres owned and the amount of capital invested but by the number of growers. If this principle is adopted, the bigger growers will not be able to run away with what they want. In this connection, I would also say that instead of nominating the President, the Government should do this. The Government should ask the respective organisations of the big growers, the small growers, labour and the consumers to send in the names of their representatives and then include Members of Parliament. Then, the Board constituted in this way should be asked to elect its Chairman. If this procedure is adopted, then the Government can see that no big grower is elected to the chairmanship. In that case, only a man who can command a majority in the Board will be elected and that man will see to it that justice is done to all the interests concerned. But here, the Government, in the name of taking over control of the industry, wants to bureaucratise the whole industry. I don’t think that by bureaucratising the Board the Government will be able in any way to help the industry to develop or to bring about better working conditions for the labour. One member in the Select Committee said that no representation should be given to labour. That is the attitude of the growers. That is the attitude generally of all employers in this country. But is it just on their part to deny representation to labour as well as to the consumers? Certainly, the rights of these people should be recognised, but personally I don’t think that by merely giving representation to labour on the Board the Government can do justice to labour. It is true that the Minister in the Select Committee as well as in his reply to the debate in the other House said that the working conditions of labour were very pitiable and deplorable and should be improved. Sir, there was also a petition sent to the Lok Sabha by the employees of the Coffee House recommending to the House that their petition should be considered. The employers deny the rights of the workers and they say that they have made all efforts to develop the industry in all these 13 years. At whose cost? It is at the cost of the workers, by paying them low wages. They have made a huge profit which is expressed in the reply of Mr. Radcliffe to a question of the hon. Minister for Commerce and Industry that he had been distributing a dividend of 13 ½ per cent in one year. In one year he had given 20 per cent dividend, in another year 27 per cent and in yet another year he gave 19 per cent to his shareholders. At the same time, this big dividend is after deducting the expenses including depreciation, taxation reserve fund and reserve fund to capital invested. Apart from all these, they have made a net profit so as to distribute an average dividend at 13 ½ per cent. Can anybody imagine that such an industry should be allowed to distribute this high dividend at the cost of the poor labour who actually produced this profit? Certainly at the cost of the poor labour and the people, they have got this profit. The coffee houses are getting coffee at the rate of Rs. 210 per kilo At the same time, how do they sell coffee there? Submit