GUWAHATI: The Assam government on Sunday resumed its eviction drive against illegal settlers on forest land. The drive, carried out in some eastern, western and northern Assam districts earlier, was halted in the aftermath of music icon Zubeen Garg’s mysterious death in Singapore.
It was resumed in western Assam’s Goalpara district. The forest department demolished 588 houses spread across 153 hectares at the Dahikata Reserve Forest.
“Eviction notices were served on 588 households, days ahead of the drive,” Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) of Goalpara, Tejas Mariswami told TNIE.
He also said that upon receiving the notices, 30 to 40 per cent of the illegal settlers had vacated their houses by taking along valuables. “There was no major resistance or confrontation as such. Everything passed off peacefully,” Mariswami said.
A large majority of the evicted people are Bengali Muslims. The Dahikata Reserve Forest is an important elephant habitat.
“We will revive this elephant habitat through a plantation drive which will be launched in March or April next year. The plantations will help curb incidents of human-elephant conflict which is common in some parts of Goalpara,” the DFO said.
“We are going reserve forest by reserve forest. We have cleared encroachment at eight reserve forests. There are some more areas where encroachment has to be cleared,” he further stated.
This story was originally published in newindianexpress.com. Read the full story here.
