Guwahati: Nearly 6,000 people evicted from Lutumari Reserved Forest, who had earlier threatened to boycott the election over delays in land allotment for rehabilitation, have now decided to vote. They fear that abstention could jeopardise their chances of securing a plot in the future and result in their names being removed from the electoral rolls. The evicted families are enrolled as voters in the Hojai assembly constituency.In contrast, nearly 1,000 evicted voters from Paikan Reserve Forest in Assam’s Goalpara district will travel to the forest area on Thursday — not to reclaim the land they once inhabited, but to exercise their franchise. “We do not want to miss our democratic right despite displacement,” they said.Over 1,200 Bengali-speaking Muslim families were evicted by the Nagaon district administration for allegedly occupying nearly 6,000 bighas of the forest in the district. According to the administration, the forest was notified over a century ago, yet the families had been living there for several decades.Enrolled as voters in the Hojai assembly constituency, about 200 of the 1,200 evicted families have spent the past four months under tarpaulin sheets pitched along a village road at Chankhula, turning the roadside into a fragile shelter. Displaced from their homes, they took refuge in this area under the Kampur revenue circle in Barhampur assembly constituency after the eviction, despite not being registered voters of that seat. Chankhula, nearly 8km from the eviction site, has since become their temporary address as they struggle with uncertainty, exposure to the elements, and the daily question of when — or whether — they will ever return home.Rashid Ali (47) said, “Initially, we all decided to boycott the election. Since the eviction, no one from any political party has asked how we have been spending our days and nights. Our demand for rehabilitation remains the same. But people here decided to vote instead of boycotting — otherwise, it might create problems in the future.”Ali had his residence at No.-2 Majgaon, along with about 800 other families. No.-2 Majgaon was one of the villages where the eviction was carried out.Abdul Hameed (115) said most families had settled in No.-2 Majgaon inside the forest in 1983, after being forced to flee their earlier homes in Barpeta district in lower Assam, Morigaon in central Assam, and parts of Nagaon district. They had fled the violence that marked the six-year anti-foreigner movement between 1979 and 1983.Meanwhile, nearly 1,000 of the 1,497 people evicted from Paikan Reserved Forest in Goalpara district last year remain enrolled at the Bidyapara ME School polling booth, which falls within the forest land in the Goalpara East constituency.Their designated polling station ceased to exist after the eviction and has since been converted into a forest department office. However, election officer Pallabi Borah said the forest department has vacated the premises temporarily to allow voting.Johrul Sheikh, a resident of Bidyapara who was evicted along with several others, said his family does not own land anywhere else in the state and is currently sheltering at a relative’s house near the eviction site.“The situation is the same for other evicted families. They are all living like us,” he said. Despite the eviction, he added, they will cast their votes at the Bidyapara ME School polling booth. “We have been voting there for nearly four decades, ever since we began living in the area — until the evictions were carried out. We are going to vote this year as well, and our demand for rehabilitation will remain until it is met.”
