Guwahati: Two persons were killed in police firing, and at least 11 others wounded in clashes during an eviction drive in Assam’s Sonapur area, roughly 35km from Guwahati, on Thursday. Among the 11 injured are eight villagers and three police personnel, who had to be hospitalised.
The police identified the deceased as Haider Ali and Zubahir Ali from the Kachutali Pathar village in the Sonapur subdivision of the Kamrup metropolitan district. During the drive, “22 government officials were injured as well, some critically”, police said.
On Thursday, the district administration conducted eviction proceedings in the village for the third time since Monday — 9 September. Villagers were occupying government land in the notified tribal belt of Sonapur, Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma told mediapersons after the incident.
The first two days of the eviction went peacefully, without any untoward incident. But on Thursday afternoon, a clash erupted between the villagers, civil officials and police personnel deployed at the site.
Social media posts show officials making announcements asking villagers to clear the area. But the situation soon took an ugly turn as villagers and officials clashed. Villagers wielded sticks, and the police resorted to blank firing to disperse them, according to sources.
The clashes broke out when officials stepped in to dismantle the makeshift sheds of the villagers before they had time to shift to another location — officials knocking down their belongings riled up the evicted villagers — the sources said.
Taking to X on Thursday evening, Director General of Assam Police G.P. Singh said that in the wake of the “targeted attack by miscreants”, police resorted to “authorised use of force following due process”.
“In this, 13 persons were injured, of whom two have been declared dead at the hospital,” he wrote. The post said government officials, including on-duty police, were “attacked with sharp weapons and stones”.
Guwahati city police, Singh said, have directions to identify all the miscreants, who had been involved in the attack on government officials and take lawful action.
ThePrint reached out to Kamrup Metro District Commissioner Sumit Sattawan over calls but did not receive a response.
Speaking to ThePrint, All Assam Minority Students’ Union president Rejaul Karim Sarkar rubbished police claims and said the villagers reacted only when the police resorted to firing.
“For two days, it (administration) had peacefully carried out the eviction. The villagers had not protested and were ready to leave the area. They settled here after the river eroded their homes and land away. All they needed was a little time to move to another location.”
The injured were taken to the civil hospital in Sonapur, and later, referred to Gauhati Medical College Hospital.
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‘Villagers provoked’
Hours after the violence, Chief Minister Sarma accused the Congress of statements against the eviction drive since Thursday morning — which, he alleged, provoked a section of people to revolt.
“It was a peaceful eviction drive in Sonapur, a tribal belt and block (protected under Assam Land and Revenue Regulation, 1886). The evicted people had left for their original homes in the Darrang and Morigaon districts, and we were tracking them. From (Thursday) morning, the Congress started provoking people against the eviction.”
Sarma also announced the eviction drive would continue, adding, “We have already evicted the encroachers from the government land. Those who settled in patta land will also get notices to clear the area.”
Leader of Opposition in the state assembly — Congress’s Debabrata Saikia — dismissed the allegations as “baseless and unfounded”.
“He (CM) is scared about Congress’s popularity in Upper Assam since the Lok Sabha elections. He wants to project the Congress as anti-Assamese, and with that agenda, he’s doing all this. It’s very unfortunate. The government is supposed to give eviction notice, according to the Gauhati High Court order, but the chief minister is not following due procedures of law,” Saikia said.
Seeking justice for the deceased villagers in a post on X, Congress MP Abdul Khaleque demanded a high-level inquiry into the incident by a sitting judge.
This is not the first time the Assam government’s eviction plans have had fatal outcomes. In September 2021, two persons were killed in police firing during another controversial eviction drive at Dholpur village in Sipajhar in Assam’s Darrang district.
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‘Mama, my life is ruined’
Earlier in the day, videos broadcast in media from the eviction site showed beds and belongings under tarpaulin, tin sheets and betel nut trees razed to the ground, and a child fearfully looking into the camera from inside a tin shed.
Addressing the chief minister as “Mama (uncle)” — as he is fondly referred to in Assam — an affected villager told a local news channel, “So many of our people evicted, our homes broken down, yet no one from the administration has come to provide us with any relief. I have small children. Mama, my life is ruined. I wanted my children to go to school.”
“Who will look after my kids? We could not cook for the past three days as our house lies in ruins. Are we not the people of Assam? Check our NRC, Aadhaar — if you think we are not from Assam, send us to Bangladesh,” the villager said.
During the eviction process, 300-400 displaced villagers, with no place to call home, had assembled on the railway track under the Digaru-Tetelia section of Northeast Frontier Railway’s (NFR’s) Lumding Division, disrupting rail traffic for roughly two hours, an NFR official said. Later, after the clearing of the track, normal train operations resumed.
‘Wilful targeting’
The All Assam Minority Students’ Union (AAMSU) has come down heavily on the Sarma government, saying the firing was “wilfully” carried out to target the minority population.
Questioning the circumstances that led to the firing, AAMSU leader Sarkar said, “They had requested the administration for time and assembled their belongings at the evicted site. They have children to consider. But, the administration aggressively started dismantling their tents and belongings — covered with tarpaulin — leading to arguments with the evicted lot.”
According to police, the administration cleared 248 bighas of government land of encroachments and removed 237 illegally constructed structures.
“Why does the government not take action against those who sold this piece of land to the villagers, if it falls under tribal belts and blocks? How come the villagers have land deeds?” the AAMSU leader said.
Opposition parties, All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) and the Raijor Dal, also condemned the incident and demanded an investigation into the killings.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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Illegal settlers on govt land must be evicted. If necessary, force must be used. No negotiations and no clemency.
Media outlets like The Print try to add a communal twist to a simple eviction drive.