JORHAT, March 3 - Addressing a press conference here today, several citizens of Jorhat appealed Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal to order the authority concerned to cancel the �illegal allotment of agricultural land for commercial purposes� in Malowpathar and some other agrarian areas in the district as the gangs of land-grabbers and corrupt government officials had already reclassified the fertile paddy-fields as �non-agricultural land� by violating legal provisions and compelled the farmers to sell it to businessmen for profit-making purposes.
�It was a clear violation of many specified provisions of The Assam Agricultural Land (Regulation of Reclassification and Transfer for Non-Agricultural Purpose) Act, 2015. Corrupt officials of district administration and gang of land-grabbers have compelled farmers to sell their fertile agricultural land of Malowpathar to businessmen for profit-making business,� said advocate Rintu Goswami.
Other citizens and advocates of Jorhat also alleged that government officials of Revenue Department reclassified the fertile area near Rowriah Jan of Malowpathar as non-agricultural land through illegal means, which was handed over to some businessmen for setting up a commercial educational institution.
They said that the land of the agrarian area cannot be converted into non-agricultural land as agricultural activities were done profitably by the farmers till the last sowing season of 2016.
