The Forest Department suspended a forest officer on Monday for hill-cutting, unsanctioned by the department, at Mirsarai upazila in Chittagong.
Sources said the accused, Jahangir Alam, forest beat officer in Jorarganj area, was constructing a car park area by cutting a hill near the Mahamaya project in Durgapur area in the upazila even though the government had already allocated land for said car park.
Jahangir and his subordinate officials allegedly aimed to usurp the government land, which is why they took up cutting the hill near Mahamaya without taking sufficient safety measures, the sources said.
Locals complained that the forest officials have absolutely no regards for the safety of the people living in the area. “There was a huge landslide a day ago from the side of the hill they are cutting. It is lucky that there was no one near the site at the time it happened, otherwise a number of lives would be lost,” said Saiful Islam, local grocer.
The Forest Department eventually took action against Jahangir after receiving several complaints from the locals.
“The department did not authorise any such hill cutting in that area. The Chittagong district forest conservator, MA Khalek, is already taking strict measures to deal with this matter. Jahangir was suspended from duty. Also, a five-member probe committee, headed by Sitakunda Botanical Garden Director Yasin Newaz, has been formed to investigate this matter,” said Mohammad Hossain, assistant forest conservator at North Chittagong, when the Dhaka Tribune contacted him.
However, locals claimed that it was actually the forest range officer of Mirsarai who was directing Jahangir, his subordinate, to cut the hill.
The Dhaka Tribune contacted the forest range officer in question, Muktaruzzaman in this regard, who said he would talk later and then turned his mobile phone off.
The Dhaka Tribune also contacted Jahangir for comment, who said it was a wrong number. However, the Dhaka Tribune verified with several local forest officials who said the number was correct.