Influential land grabbers occupy nearly ninety percent of the country’s khas (public) land as identified so far, said Abul Barkat, a Dhaka University professor, at a workshop in the capital yesterday.
Total amount of khas land identified so far all over the country is five million acres, of which agricultural land and water bodies constitute 1.2 million acres each, he said.
Land grabbers, mostly the real estate developers, illegally occupy around 10,000 acres of khas land including water bodies in and around the capital, Barkat said citing a parliamentary committee report in a keynote presentation.
National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Association for Land Reform and Development and IMSE-India jointly organised the two-day South Asian regional workshop on Human Rights and Right to Land at the Brac Centre Inn.
According to Prof Barkat’s presentation, 56 percent of the country’s total households were landless until 2006. Land ownership of the indigenous people is also declining at an increased rate.
Of the 37 million acres of land in the country, 43 percent land is privately owned while five million acres of land is under litigation, he said.
Annual figure of land-related litigation is 3.2 million, of which 1.4 million remain pending with the court which causes an average of 9.5 suffering-years for each litigant, Prof Barkat said.
Only one percent of Tk 2,48,599 million spent in land-related litigations goes to public exchequer as revenue while the rest is spent in bribery for police, land and court officials, he said.
Prof Mizanur Rahman, chairman of NHRC, said many private individuals have so far filed complaints with the commission against real estate developers particularly in the periphery of Dhaka city stating that the later have grabbed their ancestral land and homestead through fictitious documents.
The full commission has summoned some developers, asking them to explain their position, he said.
Law Minister Shafique Ahmed in his speech as the chief guest said the government is set to pass an amendment to the relevant civil laws in the next session of parliament to introduce Alternative Dispute Resolution with an aim to reduce the number of land-related litigations.
A trained mediator will persuade the feuding parties to resolve their disputes out of the conventional courts to save their money and social relationship, he said.
The law minister said Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) Land Dispute Resolution Commission could not be successful due to non-cooperation of the local representatives, who are also the members of the commission.
The people of CHT are not indigenous; they should be treated as tribal, he added.
Justice Shri Narayan Chandra Sil, acting chairperson of West Bengal Human Rights Commission, among others, spoke on the occasion.
-With The Daily Star input
