Fear never leaves Bagda farm Santals
The Santal people whose houses in Gaibandha's Gobindaganj were set on fire in 2016 are now facing homelessness again as they are among the nearly 1,500 families who might be evicted to make way for setting up an export processing zone.
Five years ago today, three Santal men were killed and many others injured during a clash as police tried to evict an entire Santal community from a piece of land that the people say they got from their ancestors. But the authorities of Rangpur Sugar Mills claim that it is theirs.
Following the clash, rickety shacks of the underprivileged people were set on fire and about 2,500 Santal and Bangali families in the area known as Bagda Farm lost all or part of their belongings.
About 1,500 of those families still live there and the nearby Madarpur and Joypurpara areas. The EPZ the government plans to establish will make them homeless and they will lose the land where they grow rice and other crops.
Maj Gen Nazrul Islam, executive chairman of Bangladesh Export Processing Zones Authority (Bepza), met the deputy commissioner of Gaibandha and other stakeholders on August 24. But no representative from the Santal community was present at the meeting.
The Santals have been regularly demonstrating against the planned EPZ.
On November 12, 2019, the government decided to establish the EPZ on 1,832.27 acres of land at a governor board meeting of the Bepza.
It was decided that the Ministry of Industries, which claims ownership of the land, would hand over the land to Bepza.
Last year, the local administration set the estimated price of the land at Tk 213.39 crore.
"The ministry of industries is in the final stage to hand over the land to Bepza," said Ashraful Kabir, project director of the EPZ.
Nazma Binte Alamgir, general manager (public relations) at Bepza, said construction work would begin soon at the site.
Backed by local influential people, police on November 6, 2016, opened fire on the Santals, leaving three people dead and many others injured. Their huts and shacks were torn down and eventually 2,500 Santal families got evicted.
Contacted, Philimon Baske, president of the Sahebganj-Bagda Farm Bhumi-Uddhar Sangram Committee, said, "The Santal people have no experience of other jobs. They don't have education or property. If the government evicts them again, they will have no place to live. We can't let the EPZ be built here.
"The land is ours, but the ministry of industries is selling it to Bepza. We will stop this by any means."
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