Over 1000 migrant Muslim families were evicted from the Lumding forest brought by land mafia Nazrul alias Babar and company for turmeric cultivation from 2007 onwards.
Guwahati: Thousands of hectares of government land are being encroached in Assam, mostly by migrant Muslims. Efforts are on to evict these illegal encroachments. The Assam government has evicted the huge encroachment in Dhalpur, Gorukhuti, in September this year. The eviction drive in Dhalpur turned violent when PFI trained miscreants attacked the police force and injured 11 on-duty police personnel.
On 8 November Assam government, at the directive of the Guwahati High Court, evicted thousands of acres of land in the Lumding Reserve forest. Thousands of migrant Muslim families from various districts of Assam encroached on almost 1400 hectares of land in the Reserve forest in Lumding.
Chief Minister Dr. Himanta Biswa Sarma revealed that some mafias are systematically encroaching the forest land for business purposes. For more than a decade, one Nazrul Islam alias Babar Bhai and his partner Anuar Hussain systematically encroached hundreds of acres of forest land, bringing thousands of families from different parts of the state for turmeric cultivation.
These land mafias cultivate turmeric in more than 500 acres of forest land and earn rupees 25 crores every year. It should be mentioned that the families who had encroached on the reserve forest are not landless. These people have land and property in other state places and were brought to encroached reserve forest land for business purposes. Assam police on Tuesday arrested land mafia Nazrul Isalm alias Babar Bhai and Anuar Hussain from the Nakhuti area of Hojai district.
Police sources in Hojai said that after the arrest of Nazrul, police would be able to crack the Turmeric syndicate run by land mafias by encroaching forest land. It should be mentioned that more than 1000 migrant Muslim families were evicted from the Lumding forest, who were brought by land mafia Nazrul and company for turmeric cultivation from 2007 onwards.
On the other hand, the Assam government has served notice to hundreds of encroachers' families in Barchala and Dhekiajuli constituencies. These migrant Muslim families from different state districts had encroached on the riverine areas (Char) of both the constituencies. These people have created a threat to change the demography of these constituencies. The administration has notified the encroachers to leave the Char by 15 December.
