Guwahati: Assam CM Himanta Biswa Sarma on July 15 exposes the dangerous land jihad ploy by Bangladeshi origin Muslims in Upper Assam districts. Addressing a press meet in Dispur CM Sarma said after complete dominance in maximum Lower Assam district, these people are now targeting Upper Assam districts like Lakhimpur and Golaghat. Recently conducted eviction drive in Lakhimpur district exposes the ploy to change the demography of the Hindu majority district by Bangladeshi origin Muslims.
He said the recently evicted families in Lakhimpur traveled hundreds kilometers to encroach forest land in the district. 74 families Bangladeshi origin Muslim families from Barpeta district, which is over 400 kilometers away, 63 families from Nagaon (250 kilometers away), 7 families from Goalpara (480 kilometers away), 2 families each from Cachar (550 kilometers away) and South Salmara ( 590 kilometers away) went to Lakimpur and encroached forest land and established villages to change the demography of the district. CM Sarma said that the government scrutinised and found that the encroacher families have their relatives in the origin places and they were not landless. Their sole purpose was to grab government land and change the demographics of Hindu majority assembly constituencies and districts.
CM Sarma further said that for the past one year Muslim people from Nagaon district were encroaching forest land in Uriamghat in Golaghat district. Now night buses are plying between Dhing in Nagaon district and Uriamghat in Golaghat district to carry these people. These people are trying to change the demography of the Upper Assam districts. If Assamese people do not prevent this ploy, in next 20 years the forest cover in Assam will vanish and most importantly the demography of the upper Assam district will be changed forever. If we see the voter list of Lakhimpur district it has changed drastically in the last 15-20 years, the CM said. He further said that so called intellectuals and left liberals are opposing the eviction drives but local Assamese people and Tai Ahom Student Union in Uriamghat have submitted a memorandum to conduct eviction in encroached forest land.
Himanta government’s action
The Himanta Biswa Sarma government has carried out a series of massive eviction drives in Assam in the last 4 years. So far the government has cleared 119,548 (40,000 acres) Bighas of land from the encroachment of Bangladeshi origin Muslims. “In the last 4 years, we have freed up over 160 Sq.Km of land in Assam. This is about 75% of the total area of our capital Guwahati. We are committed to free every inch of land from encroachers.”, CM Sarma said. The government has successfully prevented the ploy to change the demography of many Hindu majority constituencies in Assam. CM Sarma further said that all these actions taken by his government are against the ongoing land jihad in the state.
He again mentioned that if Assamese people do not awake at this moment, it will be too late after 15-20 years. He also said that more than four times of the cleared land are still under the encroachment of Bangladeshi origin Muslims. He also mentioned that after huge demographic changes in Lower and Middle Assam these people are now eying demographic invasion in Upper Assam. They initially tried the invasion in Kaziranga National Park, but the BJP government thwarted it. Apparently, they tried it in Lakhimpur, Lumding, Uriamghat etc. But the government has failed their mission.
Once they are a sizable voter in an assembly constituency, the local leadership resist eviction and subsequently they successfully change the demography. This happened in Lower and Middle Assam, we cannot allow it to happen in Upper Assam, the CM added. He also mentioned that a total of 9 lakhs acres of forest land are still under encroachment in the state and roughly about 60 percent of these forest land are under encroachment of Bangladeshi origin Muslims. CM Sarma said that during the previous Congress government one Suleman Chaudhury was made DFO in Goalpara district and he himself felicitated thousands of Muslim people to settle in forest land. The same DFO is now fighting in the court as advocate for the evicted encroachers.
