Border survey move about to fall thru'
Resumption of much-talked joint survey of Sylhet-Meghalaya borders scheduled for today has become uncertain again.
Bangladesh survey officials are yet to get necessary instructions from the higher authorities while the Indian survey team has not informed their Bangladesh counterpart of their preparation for the task as of yesterday.
“Although the task was scheduled to resume on January 4, it may not be possible for different reasons. We are expecting instructions from the monitoring committee, which was formed last week to look into the survey related works,” Additional Deputy Commissioner (Rev) of Sylhet Dr Md Abul Hasan, who is heading the survey team, told this correspondent yesterday evening.
The Ministry of Home Affairs formed the monitoring committee headed by AMB Fazlur Rahman, deputy director of the Department of Land Records and Survey.
“Although we had wanted to keep the survey suspended till December 20 on the occasion of holidays like Victory Day and Ashura, it had to be delayed for a few more days as the survey team from Meghalaya had requested for further delay on account of Christmas,” Dr Hasan said.
Earlier on December 15, Bangladesh Rifles and Indian Border Security Force held a flag meeting following the tense situation due to intrusion of about 500 Indian Khasia tribesmen and some BSF men into the Bangladesh territory through the remote Padua-Protappur borders in Gowainghat upazila the previous night. The intruders, were, however, driven back by Bangladeshi villagers the same night.
After the flag meeting, the officials of both sides discussed different documents but the joint survey remained suspended since then.
The Indians had been pressing for suspending the ongoing survey on Padua-Protappur border areas, where they had been occupying about a hundred acres of Bangladesh lands for years.
Border sources said the Indian Khasia tribesmen had been opposing the survey on Dibir Haor border in Jaintapur upazila claiming about 50 acres of Bangladesh lands as belonging to them. The Indians also pressed for suspending survey on Sonarhat-Lynkhat border, where about 80 acres of Bangladesh lands had been under the possession of Indians.
Asked about the Indian claims, Dr Hasan said, “We had pressed on the basis of our documents and the boundary pillars and accordingly we asked for documents in support of their claims.”
An uneasy calm, except the tense situation following the Indians' intrusion on December 14 night, has been prevailing on about 20 kilometre border from Sonarhat to Dibir Haor in Gowainghat, Kanaighat and in Jaintapur upazilas as a joint survey began on December 7.
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