Taskforce committees formed to implement master plan in Jungle Salimpur slums
Several task force committees have been formed to formulate a master plan to implement the eco-friendly development plan in the slums of Jungle Salimpur, under the government's master plan while keeping the biodiversity and environment intact.
The task force committees will come up with plans and how to implement those in evicting all slum dwellers of Jungle Salimpur within one month, reads a press release issued by the Chattogram District Administration.
"We have lists of genuine landless people living in the slums. Those landless will be rehabilitated in their upazilas under Ashrayan and Guchhogram project," the deputy commissioner told TBS over the phone after attending a meeting on the implementation of various projects in Jungle Salimpur held at the Prime Minister's Office on Monday evening.
Mominur also said, "All those who destroyed mountains, cut trees and built illegal structures on government land will be arrested. Everyone who has been named in the cases will be arrested."
Principal Secretary to Prime Minister Ahmad Kaikaus presided over the meeting.
In the meeting, local authorities concerned and law enforcement agencies have been asked to recover around 3,100 acres of the land known as a terrorist den in the slums.
Chattogram City Corporation Mayor Rezaul Karim Chowdhury, who was present in the meeting, declined to say anything about what was discussed in the meeting.
Among others, higher officials of the Public Security Division, Energy and Mineral Resources Division, Ministry of Housing and Public Works, Department of Local Government, Department of Power, Ministry of Lands, Department of Rural Development and Cooperatives, Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief, Department of Security Services, and Department of Law and Justice were present in the meeting.
Regarding the plan to evict and arrest thousands of people from the slums of Jungle Salimpur,
Human Rights Activist Nur Khan Liton told TBS that none can evict any citizen from home without ensuring proper rehabilitation. There are High Court directives on the issue too.
Around one lakh homeless people have been living in the settlements built on 850 acres of khas land at Jungle Salimpur and Alinagar near the port city. Most of them lost their ancestral homes due to climate change-induced disasters.
In 2004, the then government sheltered these homeless people in the area after evicting them from various slums in Chattogram city.
