Chittagong district administration has been in a standoff with people living near hill areas regarding their evacuation, as the administration fears possible landslides in the approaching rainy season.
The district administration planned to move 500 families from the Batali and Akbar Shah Mazar hills into makeshift houses for three months. However, the people living beneath or near the hills are not willing to move.
“We will not go anywhere, leaving our own home, even for a few days,” says Abul Khayer, 50, a resident of the Batali Hill area. He has been running a tea stall in the area for the past 20 years.
Maya Begum, 50, whose family from Noakhali has been living just beneath Batali Hill for 20 years, expressed the same rigidity about not moving elsewhere.
“Does the government pay me the money that I earn here every month from renting out three rooms?” she said.
Apparently, most of these people are very poor, and have been living in Batali, Motijhorna, Akbar Shah Mazar, Boiltoliguna, Biswa Bank Colony and other hill areas – land owned by the government – for years.
A number of them have built houses at the foot of hills and rented rooms out to supplement their income.
Md Zahidul Haque, 40, has lived beside Batali Hill with his family for the past 15 years. He owns a house with 10 rooms, of which he rents out five. He receives Tk7,500 per month from rent.
His wife Rahima Begum, 30, said they do not want to be evicted because it will cause them losses.
The district administration has taken up the “hill rehabilitation project” to move people from 13 vulnerable areas to avoid causalities and damage caused by landslide during the rainy season, the months of May, June and July.
Twenty people were killed in the Akbar Shah Mazar hill area in recent landslides. The death toll was 17 in 2011 at Batali Hill; 121 people were killed in the district in 2005.
The hills of the Chittagong region are mostly made of soft soil, which causes landslides after heavy rainfall.
Additional Deputy Commissioner (revenue) Humayun Kabir said the evacuation process started today.
Initially, 500 families (400 from Batali and 100 from Akbar Shah Mazar area) will be moved to a Bangladesh Railway field just one kilometre away. The authorities have planned a makeshift arrangement by setting up tents – one for each family.
Humayun told the Dhaka Tribune the authorities would use force if necessary to evacuate these people for the sake of their safety.
When asked whether moving people for just one season was a solution, he said they were doing this as a short-term solution.
“Such unplanned urbanisation, where many people live in slums, could be avoided if the government created adequate employment opportunities across the country,” he said.
