It is imperative that law enforcers take all practical steps to apprehend the people responisble for the multiple arson attacks at land ministry offices on Sunday.
Deputy commissioners from 14 districts reported over 18 different arson attacks on land offices at upazillas across the country.
This deliberate targeting of land offices comes just days after the Land Ministry asked the Home Ministry to order extra security for its many hundreds of unprotected offices.
While police have blamed pickets involved in the the BNP alliance-led blockade for the attacks, a full investigation is still needed to idenify those responsible.
Land Ministry officials have pointed out that non-political criminals could also have a motive for undertaking these types of attack. Corrupt officials, forgers, or land grabbers could all have taken advantSage of the poltical turmoil to target land offices to try and burn land records.
The high number of outstanding land disputes across the country already causes tremendous misery for citizens due to poor recordkeeping practices and would be complicated even further by the destruction of records.
Allowing land offices to fall prey to arsonists would set the country back hugely by disrupting ongoing plans to build new land offices and digitise the national land record management system.
It is a matter of the utmost priority to catch the culprits responsible and to enhance security for land ministry offices to deter future incidents.
