The cultivation and brewing of tea in India has a long history of applications in traditional systems of medicine and for consumption. The consumption of tea in India was first clearly documented in the Ramayana (750-500 BC). Research shows that tea is indigenous to eastern and northern India, and was cultivated and consumed there for thousands of years.
However, commercial production of tea in India did not begin until the arrival of the British East India Company, at which point large tracts of land were converted for mass tea production.Today, India is one of the largest tea producers in the world, though over 70% of the tea is consumed within India itself. A number of renown teas, such as Darjeeling, also grow exclusively in India.
The Indian tea industry has grown to own many global tea brands, and has evolved to one of the most technologically equipped tea industries in the world. Tea production, certification, exportation, and all other facets of the tea trade in India is controlled by the Tea Board of India.
In an 1877 pamphlet written by Samuel Baildon, and published by W. Newman and Co. of Calcutta, Baildon wrote, "...various merchants in Calcutta were discussing the chance of imported China seeds thriving in Assam, when a native from the province present, seeing some tea said, 'We have the plant growing wild in our jungles.'" It is then documented that the Assamese nobleman, Maniram Dutta Barua, (also known as Maniram Dewan) showed British surveyors existing fields used for tea cultivation and wild tea plants growing in the Assamese jungle
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