The Chandpur Sadar upazila administration ran an eviction drive on Thursday, from morning until 5:30pm, against the grabbing of more than 1,000 acres of farmland in Mukhddi and Taltatoli of Ibrahimpur union on the bank of the Meghna, where land had been dug into ponds (jheels) and the soil sold. The embankments of the ponds were cut and the fish in them released into the river, Samakal reported. Nobody was detained: the accused fled before the drive.
Upazila Nirbahi Officer SMN Jamiul Hikma said more than 1,000 acres of government and private land had been occupied and dug out illegally for fish farming. The administration had run about 40 drives before without stopping the grab; the remote area and the rough Meghna make operations difficult. Three cases have been filed over the soil cutting and fish farming, naming about 48 people.
Local people allege that an influential ring dug 70 to 100 ponds on their farmland and on government khas land, cut away the fertile topsoil and sold it to brick kilns and elsewhere, threatening and beating landowners who resisted. According to the administration, most of the occupiers came from Shariatpur, joined by influential people in Chandpur.
Nurul Islam Rarhi, one of those affected, said their forefathers grew crops on this land until the ring seized it and sold the soil. Idris Ali said he owns 22 acres of ancestral land in Mukhddi and was beaten when he tried to stop the digging.
Sheikh Farid Ahmed Manik, MP for Chandpur-3, who was present, said farmland will shrink if this continues and nobody involved will be spared. Recovered khas land will be allotted to landless families under the rules, private land returned to its owners, and there is potential for a solar power project there, he said.
Photo: Fishing boat on the Meghna, Nurunnaby Chowdhury (Hasive) / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Source: Samakal
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