3 years ago, an eviction drive left 2 dead in Assam. Now, probe finds police should have exercised restraint, though govt took the right call

Hours after the incident, the Assam CM announced an inquiry into the deaths. The findings have yet to be made public. However, the report found that the government had “every right to conduct evictions” in the area, a source said. The report also makes 16 key recommendations.

“It lays out that no one has the right to occupy public land, be it forest land, grazing land or tribal land since it is public property, everyone has equal right to it and occupying it denies others of their right to it… it also points to the criminality of the act of land grabbing,” said the source.

However, the report also finds that the notice period given to the residents was short and recommends that police exercise restraint, it has been learnt.

The eviction drive saw approximately 1,300 families, most of them Bengali Muslim, evicted from around 10,000 bighas of the land. Soon afterwards, work on the multi-crore Gorukhuti agriculture project began.

According to the Assam government’s data , 10,620 families have been evicted from government land since 2016, of which 5,854 had been evicted since May 20, 2022. Four people had been killed in these evictions.