Editorial
Rajuk's demolition drive
Evict the encroachers permanently
RAJUK demolished around 100 illegal structures on Gulshan Lake on Tuesday as part of its plan to recover the lake land lost to encroachers. Obviously, there is no good alternative to enforcing the law to remove the shanties growing endlessly along the lake shoreline.
The matter, however, has some other aspects that need to be examined critically. The big, influential encroachers are actually renting out the shanties to poor people to retain their hold on the illegally grabbed land. When the shanties are demolished a large number of the residents become homeless and a humanitarian crisis looms large. But nobody seems to delve deep into and question why the shanties were allowed to be built on the lake land, in the first place. There is reason to believe that the law enforcers made no serious attempt to nip it in the bud and more and more structures were raised. Now, the real culprits who used the lake land to earn money are not being punished. Rather, the poor residents of the shanties suddenly find themselves pitted against the law enforcers. Rajuk owes an explanation to the city dwellers why it failed to act when the encroachers started taking possession of lake land. The encroachers are actually exploiting the vulnerability of the poor who are forced to live in those makeshift structures.
Regrettably, the break-and-make game never comes to an end. Usually, the encroachers return soon after the law enforcers leave the place. How long will the game continue? Rajuk, or the law enforcers for that matter, have to identify the powerful groups of encroachers who are occupying government land in many places. They are known to have enough political and financial clout to thwart any move by Rajuk to dislodge them. So, it is the political will of the government which is needed more than anything else to deal firmly with the encroachers and corrupt government officials responsible for loss of government land.
The High court directive on the issue has to be followed in letter and spirit. It is difficult to give eviction and demolition operations a more human face because lack of tough action will only embolden the land grabbers. However, the question of rehabilitating the poor residents of shanties is also very important because every citizen has the right to have a shelter.
Rajuk and law enforcers have to drive away the real encroachers and prevent them from coming back.
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