The Assam government began a major eviction drive at encroached areas of Rengma Reserve Forest in Eastern Assam’s Golaghat district on Tuesday morning.
According to official estimates, around 4900 acres of land in Uriamghat’s reserve forest area are encroached by around 2700 families of alleged immigrant Muslims. These encroached areas are to be cleared in two phases, the first one being on Tuesday, wherein it is expected that around 2,000 families will be evicted.
“The forest department has divided the area into nine blocks, and the residents have been given notices to vacate in seven days. In preparation for the eviction, more than 1,500 forces, including police, commandos and forest protection personnel, have been deployed there,” said a district official.
The Assam government has termed encroachment in several areas of the state as “demographic invasion” by “people of one religion”. The government has initiated rigorous steps therein employing the police and security officials to remove migrant settlements. Bengali-speaking Muslims are the major affected section.
Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had led a two-week-long campaign for the Urimghat eviction. He has stated that encroachers have cleared forest land in the area for their settlement and widespread betel nut cultivation.
“More than 90% of the people have already cleared their possessions and left. Apart from Bengali Muslims, 42 Manipuri Muslims and 92 Nepali families have also been asked to evacuate from the area,” BJP’s Sarupathat MLA Biswajit Phukan, in whose constituency the eviction will take place, told The Indian Express on accusations of the eviction being a targeted exercise.
“There are 150 Bodo families who also live, but they will not be evicted since they have forest rights certificates in line with the 2006 Forest Rights Act. Representatives from the All Assam Minority Students Union also met the Chief Minister when he visited the site last week and the government will consider giving lawful compensation if there are families who were there before 1971, but first, the eviction will have to be done,” he added.
The Nagaland government has stationed police and district administration personnel along the borders in order to prevent people being evicted from Assam from entering their state.
On Sunday, the Niki Sumi faction of the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Khaplang), alleged that the eviction is being used as a facade by the Assam government for a “well-planned and precisely executed plan” to “occupy” and permanently station police personnel on disputed land along the inter-state border.
