Illegal land grabbing is a major problem in Bangladesh. At present, a huge amount of government and private lands are illegally grabbed —otherwise saying, involuntarily dispossessed from their owners — in Dhaka city and other areas in Bangladesh. According to multiple sources including the Ministry of Land of Bangladesh, influential elites grabbed around 1.3 million hectares of government-owned lands in char areas, riversides, roadsides, forests, hill tracts and other areas and a tremendous amount of privately-owned lands. Illegal land grabbing has led to widespread displacement and the loss of livelihoods of many in different areas of Bangladesh, depriving many of their own lands and leading to many deaths.
But it remains unclear whether and how much the reform steps of the interim government will be successful in ensuring better conditions for all without addressing illegal land grabbing, which has got little attention in Bangladesh so far. It is notable that the present reform steps will hopefully bring changes in the judiciary and other government institutions including land-related authorities, political parties and other aspects that will help address various direct and indirect reasons for land grabbing including corruption within the government and a lack of enforcement of land laws, along with the so-called link between land grabbers and the concerned government officials, and reduce the chance of manipulation by land grabbing powerful elites, who take advantage of vulnerable communities, groups or people and exploit their land rights.
But land grabbers are powerful political leaders, businessmen, locally influential persons and other powerful elites. They illegally grab lands forcefully when in power but they maintain good links with the newly rising powerful political elites — many of whom also illegally grab lands — and administrative elites, who facilitate land grabbing, when they are not in power. Given that illegal land grabs are not addressed, reform measures will not bring the desired outcomes because the culture of illegal land grabbing can remain and new land grabbers can follow the path of the earlier land grabbers, reviving the same culture after a certain time and affecting the government institutions (including the concerned government authorities) through corrupt means in the future too.
The vital question remains on whether it is possible to address illegal land grabs by political governments. Political governments sometimes make eviction drives against land grabs. For instance, the Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority carried out several drives in Dhaka and recovered a considerable amount of land from the bank of the Buriganga River. But these drives are mostly Dhaka-centric and limited and, moreover, political governments mostly do not do anything remarkable against the land grabbers affiliated with their parties and face barriers from their leaders. Given that the interim government has no party men, it is easier for it to address the illegal land grabbing in Dhaka and other areas.
It is desired that illegal land grabbing be addressed by the interim government. For this, it is vital to address unclear land ownership records, reduce the chance of forging legal documents and address inheritance disputes and other causes, which contribute to the huge amount of illegal land grabbing in Bangladesh, with legal and land administration-based steps. Several steps including completely digitalizing the land management system, settling pending land-related cases as speedily as possible and securing accountability among land officials and illegal land grabbers will be greatly helpful. But addressing various legal loopholes and improving land governance are not enough to address the extant illegal land grabbing —successfully.
The interim government’s steps are also crucial to recover illegally grabbed lands in the capital city and beyond and provide a strong message that no land grabbers will get de facto indemnity in the future. For this, massive drives against the illegal grabbing of government-owned and privately-owned lands across Bangladesh are vital. Along with law-enforcing agencies and other concerned authorities, political parties need to provide support to take drives and end the culture of illegal land grabbing. But the government needs to make sure that the drive is not misused.
