A vast swathe of land was purchased at a cost of Tk 9 billion under the Padma Bridge project to fill sand for river training. But, rivers eroded a large portion of this land and erosion continues.

Responsible officials of the Padma Bridge project said there was no need to purchase that land, but the authorities concerned purchased these lands due to tactics and pressure of Noor-E-Alam Chowdhury aka Liton Chowdhury, who is a former chip whip of parliament and a cousin of former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, as he organised a movement on this matter at that time.

Locals said a portion of the land compensation money had been embezzled by faking ownership as there was no actual owner of char land, which was khas (fallow) land. Even portions of the compensation belonging to several landowners were also misappropriated.

The director of the Padma Bridge project at the time, Md Shafiqul Islam, told Prothom Alo that 60-70 million cubic feet (cft) of sand was extracted for river training and most of the char lands were filled with those sands. Though lands were acquired in char areas of Madaripur, sand was filled on the land by providing compensation to several local farmers in Shariatpur. He said the decision to purchase the land was taken with the permission of the high level of the government.

According to the Padma Bridge source, char lands in Shariatpur were filled by providing a compensation of 3.5 million to the locals. Similarly, sand filling also started in Madaripur, but several chairmen of the local union parishads, who were followers of Liton Chowdhury, instigated the farmers demanding sand filling after land acquisition. The government passed the Land Acquisition Act in 2017 incorporating provisions on a three-time compensation of the price for land acquisition by the government.

As work on river training stopped in the face of local protests, the road transport and bridges minister at the time, Obaidul Quader, was informed of the matter, and he also took the opinion of then-prime minister Sheikh Hasina. She was also informed that Liton Chowdhury also behind the local protests. Bridge Division sources said Sheikh Hasina ordered purchasing the land after hearing the matter. Finally, the project proposal was passed under special arrangements by adding Tk 14 billion more to purchase the additional land. A total of 964 hectares of char lands were purchased in the next couple of years since 2016.

Liton Chowdhury went into hiding since the student-people movement toppled the government on 5 August. Locals said former vice chairman of Shibchar upazila parishad and Awami League leader Atahar Bepari, chairman of Kathalbari union Sohel Bepari, chairman of Charjanajat union Rayhan Sarkar, chairman of Matbarerchar union Fazlul Haque Munshi and former chairman of Matbarerchar union Mahmud Choudhury were behind the protest against sanding filling. They all went into hiding.

Awami League’s Kathalbari union unit president also went into hiding. He over mobile phone the Bridge Authority first wanted to lease the char land for sand filling and they also paid lease money twice. They thought river erosion and loss of crop production might happen, so they prevented the sand filling. At that time, the Bridge Division agreed to acquire lands at the negotiation of Liton Chowdhury.