Silchar Land Scam: Is Just A Tip of The Iceberg

Silchar Land Scam: Is Just A Tip of The Iceberg

SILCHAR: The arrest of a Circle officer and two employees of the Circle office of Karimganj during the last three days for their alleged involvement in an alleged land scam of crores of rupees, according to knowledgeable sources, is just a tip of the iceberg. It is not the story of Karimganj Circle only, the pattern of fraud is the same in four other Circles of Badarpur, Nilambazar, Patharkandi and Ramkrishna Nagar. In this scam are involved people from both ruling and Opposition parties, a section of employees and officials backed by land mafias. Now a strong lobby has become active to get the arrested persons out of the police custody or jail.

In the present scam, the Central Government allocated Rs 6 crore for the acquisition of land for construction of an international land port at Sutarkandi on the Indo-Bangladesh border. The allocated amount was to be paid to the 26 persons from whom the land was acquired. Quite strange, the unscrupulous employees of the Karimganj Circle office adopted fraudulent methods to change the records of the real owners of land which then were shown in others’ names. Compensation money of Rs 6 crore was paid to some others. Land mafias were also behind the scam.

The victims of fraud were left with no other choice than to file individually 26 cases in the Karimganj police station; following which, two employees of the Karimganj Circle office, Mihir Ranjan Malakar (kanungo) and Pranjit Nath (amin) were arrested. Thereafter, the former Circle Officer Homen Gohain Barua, presently posted at Dergaon in Golaghat district, was also taken into custody on Monday. An investigation team headed by DSP Sudhanya Suklabaidya is interrogating them to know their modus operandi of forging land records and transfer of ownership in others’ name.

Meanwhile, the real owners of land — Juber Ahmed Chowdhury, Tahir Raja Chowdhury, Nasir Uddin, Hifjur Rahman Chowdhury, Matin Rahman, and Isbar Ali among others — are in a state of shock, but are determined to get their compensation money. They could hardly imagine such a dare devil fraud with their lands could happen. In four other Circles of the border district, the affairs cannot be any different. Only a high-level probe can unearth the deep-rooted widespread land scam. This has been continuing for long. Now that the Sarbananda Sonowal Government has declared ‘Zero tolerance against corruption’, land scam will also be eliminated and the guilty involved punished. This is the expectation of all saner sections of society.

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