Eviction on Bakkhali River halts after resistance on fifth day
Officials, accompanied by an executive magistrate, police, RAB, and army personnel, moved towards Nuniarchhara and Natun Baharchhara with bulldozers in the morning.
The Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority (BIWTA) and the Cox's Bazar administration were forced to suspend their eviction drive on the banks of the Bakkhali River yesterday (5 September), the fifth day of operations, after facing strong resistance from locals.
Officials, accompanied by an executive magistrate, police, RAB, and army personnel, moved towards Nuniarchhara and Natun Baharchhara with bulldozers in the morning.
However, hundreds of residents blocked the main and airport roads with pushcarts and burning tyres before the team could advance.
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Despite repeated attempts by the executive magistrate and army personnel to negotiate, the protesters refused to move.
They claimed the eviction was illegal, saying they held land ledgers and had long paid taxes. Many declared they would rather die than be displaced.
As the standoff continued, traffic on both the main and airport roads was brought to a standstill, leaving law enforcement and BIWTA staff stranded with their vehicles.
At one stage, central BNP leader and former MP Lutfor Rahman Kajol, along with other political figures, arrived at the scene.
They urged the administration to review land documents before proceeding and called for the drive to be halted.
Following discussions, BIWTA temporarily suspended the operation.
After the bulldozers and law enforcement withdrew, political leaders persuaded protesters to end the blockade, and traffic returned to normal after noon.
Kajol later told journalists, "The eviction drive has created panic and raised many questions in Cox's Bazar. This is a very old settlement. Residents have land documents and tax receipts. They requested the administration to review these before making any decision. A peaceful solution is now urgent—keeping people in a state of panic is pointless."
No BIWTA official was willing to comment on the matter.
Drive repeatedly obstructed
The eviction drive began on Monday and was met with resistance from its very first day.
While the authorities cleared some illegal structures on the first two days, they could not begin operations on Wednesday, the third day of the drive, due to stiff resistance from locals.
On Thursday, residents erected bamboo barricades and blocked roads in Peshkarpara, where hundreds of men, women and schoolchildren staged sit-ins, vowing not to leave their homes "until death."
Authorities suspended the drive again, citing security concerns.
Police and BIWTA have since filed two cases over attacks on police and obstruction of officials, with 650 people as accused.
According to the police, charges were filed for obstructing government work, and efforts to arrest the accused are underway.
Bakkhali encroachment's history
According to BIWTA sources, the 81-kilometre-long Bakkhali River, which originates in Naikhongchhari, passes through Ramu and Cox's Bazar Sadar before flowing into the Bay of Bengal.
Encroachment is most severe along a six-kilometre stretch between Nuniarchhara and Majhirghat, where over 1,000 illegal structures have been built in the last decade.
In February 2010, a government gazette appointed BIWTA as conservator of the Bakkhali River Port, with instructions to hand over 721 acres of riverbank land.
As the transfer was delayed, encroachment continued, and the port was never established.
In early 2023, a joint operation cleared more than 600 illegal structures and freed over 300 acres of mangrove land, but much of the land was later reoccupied, with more than 200 houses, shops, and other structures rebuilt.
On 24 August this year, the High Court ordered the government to identify all encroachers along the Bakkhali, evict them within four months, and take measures to prevent pollution.
The court directed that the river's current flow and boundaries be determined through an RS survey.
Following the order, Shipping Adviser Brig Gen (retd) M Sakhawat Hossain visited Cox's Bazar on 30 August.
At a special coordination meeting, he said a consolidated list of encroachers would be prepared and eviction drives carried out accordingly. The operation was launched after that.
