Garo people of Tangail's Madhupur protested over an evacuation drive of the forest department in which a Garo woman's banana plants were felled from a portion of land in the Madhupur forest.
Local Garo leaders said Bashonti Rema of Pegmari village in Madhupur's Sholakuri union have been cultivating crops on 50 decimal (50 Shotok) of ancestral land in the Madhupur forest.
"The Forest Department claimed that it was their land and took a social forestry initiative there. This year the woman planted banana on her land and all of those were felled," the leaders said.
On Monday, Garo people of Pegmari and nearby areas staged a demonstration at first on the land and then in front of the forest department's Dokhla range office to protest the incident.
John Jetra, Bangladesh Garo Chhatro Shonggothon's (Bangladesh Garo Student's Association) central unit president, said: "The indigenous community of Madhupur forest have been cultivating on forest land which they acquired from their ancestors. The people have a historical right over these lands and such an evacuation drive is inhumane."
Jamal Talukdar, assistant conservator of forest in Tangail, said: "The land belongs to the forest department. We have conducted an eviction drive there in order to move forward with the social forestry program.”
