GUWAHATI: Tensions flared during an eviction drive in Assam’s Dhubri district on Tuesday when encroachers attacked excavators and allegedly attempted to target police personnel.
A group of encroachers, including women, carried out the attack with bricks and bamboo poles, damaging two excavators. The eviction drive was carried out in three Muslim villages -- Charuwa Bakra, Chirakuta and Santoshpur -- falling under the Chapar revenue circle.
Circle Officer Sashee Bhushan Raj Konwar downplayed the attack, calling it a stray incident. He said the drive was by and large peaceful. Authorities cleared about 3,500 bighas of government land where 1,069 families were settled.
The government had earlier announced one-time financial aid of Rs 50,000 to each of these families. Most of them had voluntarily shifted to other areas over the past few days after dismantling their homes.
Notices to vacate the place were served on them with a July 6 deadline.
Senior officials from the district administration along with a large number of police personnel, went to the three villages on Tuesday morning to carry out the eviction drive.
Excavators and other heavy machinery were deployed for the purpose. Some of the evicted people told the media that they had been living there for generations.
Activist-turned-MLA Akhil Gogoi, who is the president of the political party Raijor Dal, was travelling to the evicted sites to meet the people but the police stopped him on the way.
The land cleared will be used for a proposed thermal power project by the Adani group. During a recent visit to the area, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had stated that a tender for the project would be floated soon.
He on Tuesday told the media that 10 per cent of the people had to be evicted as the remaining 90 per cent of others voluntarily shifted to other places.
“Our goal is to clear lands wherever they have been encroached upon so they can be used for people’s welfare. A similar eviction drive will be carried out at a reserve forest in Goalpara district on July 10,” Sarma said.
To a query, he said, “Akhil Gogoi and we have our own brands of politics. We stand for the indigenous people while Gogoi stands for a particular community.” The BJP lent its support to the ongoing eviction drives, stating that they were being carried out at the direction of the court.
“The previous Congress government had allowed East Bengal-origin people to settle down in reserve forests for vote-bank politics. It had also allowed them to encroach upon the land of Satras (Vaishnavite monasteries). But the BJP is committed to protecting the lands of the indigenous communities,” the party in a statement said.