Bhumi Adhikar Sangram Samittee, Assam (BASSA) convened a public meeting on Monday. Various speakers at the meeting said that the BJP came to power with the slogan ‘Jaati, Maati and Bheti’ and they spoke on rights of indigenous people of the State. However, even after one year and a half of coming to power, the government failed to do anything which they had promised before the poll, many of the speakers at the meeting said. “Over the past one year and a half the government stopped issuance of land pattas to local people. However, industrialists like Baba Ramdev have been getting lands in the State at throwaway prices. Assam lands are being handed over to non-Assamese at a fast pace,” BASAA president Prab Jyoti Kalita said, and added: “What’s the aim of constituting the Hari Shankar Brahma Committee for Land Rights for Indigenous People of Assam? Is it for framing land policy or a land Act or land survey? When will the committee complete its work? The government should make this clear. How come a committee whose chairman stays at Delhi and members at different places provides land rights to 25 lakh indigenous people of the State? The committee even doesn’t have its office. Such committees and commissions were constituted by the previous government also to wash their hands of the issue. We demand inquiry into the forgery and corruption taking place in the Revenue Department and offices of DCs and circle officers in the State. We also demand immediate halt to handing over of agricultural lands for other activities, handing over of land to non-Assamese etc., failing which we’re going to start an agitation from December 16, 2017.”
