The eviction drive has been going on since September 20 in Dholpur 1 and Dholpur 3 villages in Sipajhar area. While the status of the injured person could not be ascertained, the police reported two casualties and maintained that 11 police personnel, including a DSP, were injured in the eviction drive at Dholpur.
One of the BJP government’s major poll promises before assembly elections in 2016 and 2021 was to free government land and land belonging to temples and monasteries from “encroachers” and allot them to “indigenous landless people” of the state. Similar drives evicted 70 families in Hojai’s Lanka town and 25 families in Sonitpur’s Jamugurihat town this June.
In Sipajhar, the government plans to implement a multi-crore ‘Garukhuti Project’—announced in the state budget 2021-22—which aims to use the land freed up for afforestation and agriculture activities involving indigenous youth. Such drives have often drawn criticism from opposition parties and human rights activists over the eviction of people without a proper rehabilitation plan.