Headed by Cabinet Secretary Sa'adat Hussain, the committee observed that although the law had provisions to punish illegal encroachers, it lacked proper guidelines and bite to resist encroachment and recover grabbed lands.

The secretary committee saw articles 427, 447, 448 of the criminal procedure code (CrPC) that deal with punishment to land encroachers outdated and called for making the articles tougher.

The body proposed to rename the law as the Government, Local Authority and Private Lands and Buildings (Recovery of Possession) Ordinance and an increase in jail terms to five years from two years and fines from Tk 1,000 to Tk 50,000 for land and building grabs by individuals.

In case of land or building grabs in an orchestrated way by organised gangs, the committee recommended jail terms from five to 14 years along with a fine of Tk 10 lakh.

It also recommended for introduction of non-bailable and non-settleable clauses to Section 7(1) of the ordinance.

The body suggested amendments to Section 9 (1) of the ordinance, giving trial courts the powers to fix and realise compensations from the offenders and give them to the affected people.

The 11-member secretary committee was formed on October 4 last year at Prime Minister Khaleda Zia's meeting with secretaries that pegged land grab as a national problem.

The recommendations have already been sent to the authorities concerned asking them to bring amendments to the Government and Local Authority Lands and Buildings (Recovery of Possession) Ordinance, 1970.

The committee identified dishonest real estate companies, organised gangs of frauds, criminals and cheats, forest bandits, pirates and landowners as the real culprits.

Unscrupulous shrimp farmers, industry owners, political activists and a number of trusts and organisations are also engaged in the crimes.

Some people take allotments of lands in the name of welfare organisations and turn them into their own property craftily and some others throw up slums, rickshaw and automobile garages.

The committee said crooks grab land in direct or indirect collaboration with government officials, employees and their relatives, and expatriates, the poor, hapless women and innocent people are their prime targets.

The committee put government land, vested property, abandoned and nawab estates and shoals under the land ministry and wakf (endowed lands) under the religious affairs ministry high on the list of grabbed lands.

Lands under the department of forest, roads and highways and railway division and unused lands of Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation, water-bodies and river banks under the land and fisheries and livestock ministries, unutilised or abandoned lands of government housing estates, city corporations and other local government bodies and ports are encroachers' favourite targets.

It said vast stretches of unutilised lands under agriculture, textiles, jute, liberation war affairs, food, science and information technologies, disaster management and relief and housing and public works ministries were encroached across the country.