The Assam government led by Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on 8th of October started an eviction drive in Lumding reserve forest in Hojai district to remove the illegal encroachers from the forest lands. The eviction drive went successful and the govt recovered 1410 Hectares of land that was being encroached by illegal settlers. Following the orders of Guwahati High court eviction drive was carried by the Assam Government.
As many as 1,000 security personnel include Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), Assam police have been deployed in the area to prevent any untoward situation during the eviction drive.According to the report, the Lumding reserve forest located in the Hojai district has covered an area of over 22,403 hectares and out of this 1,410 hectares have been encroached upon by people.
Chief Minister of Assam, Himanta Biswa Sarma informed that “Eviction drive has been carried out peacefully in Lumding forest. Everyone (settlers) has been sent home. The forest is free of encroachment from today. Detailed statement to be released in the evening.”
Earlier during the eviction drive conducted by the Assam Government there were Violence unleashed by muslims who illegally encroached the land .Nine police personnel were injured after violence broke out in Sipajhar of Darrang district in Assam during an anti-encroachment drive which was conducted by the administration.
Thousands of illegal migrants attacked police and govt officials with sharp weapons while they were carrying an eviction drive against Illegal Encroachment of Govt land. At least 10000 Illegal migrants from neighbouring countries, occupying about 30000 acres of land along with an ancient temple in Assam’s Darrang district were evicted as part of the state Govt drive against “illegal encroachments”, while 9 policemen were injured in the attack by the mob of illegal encroachers, 2 attackers were killed in retaliatory police firing. The eviction drive was conducted by the government of Himanta Biswa Sarma which is known to be a firebrand Hindutva leader. The land was illegally occupied by the Bengali speaking Muslims. This eviction drive was of among one of the many promises made by the BJP government to the people of Assam.
The administration said that the muslims who were illegally occupying the land were already served the notice many times but they did not move and this was the reason eviction drive has to be carried out.The muslims of the area welcomed the forces with stones, machetes and pointed bamboo sticks due to which many security forces were injured. Then the security forces used tear gas shells in order to disperse the crowd.As the mob could not be dispersed even by using tear gas shells, and several policemen were injured in the attack, the police opened fire on the attackers.
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