Families evicted from the predominantly indigenous villages in Gobindaganj upazila of Gaibandha on Sunday have been applying to the local administration for reclaiming their ancestral land for the last couple of years.

The families first lost their homes and were forced to leave the area in 1962, when the Pakistan government acquired the land for cultivation of sugarcane to be used in Rangpur Sugar Mill, found a probe by additional deputy commissioner (revenue) of the district last year.

The memorandum, which allowed Pakistan Industrial Development Corporation to acquire the 1,842.3 acres of land, mentioned that the land would be taken back by the government and returned to its previous state, if anything but sugarcane was cultivated there, added the report.

However, paddy, wheat, maize, tobacco, potato and mustard were found to be cultivated in the area by influential people who leased the area from the mill authorities, it added.

The families rendered homeless on Sunday have brought the issue to the attention of the administration in March last year. And after investigation, the probe concluded that the peasants were right in claiming the land.

“Since early July some 2,500 descendants of the families began to build shacks on a part of the land and live there,” Shajahan Ali Pradhan, a villager, told The Daily Star.

After visiting the area on Wednesday, human rights lawyer Jyotirmoy Barua said yesterday at a press conference that the eviction of the people in the given circumstance was illegal as it bypassed all legal procedures.

“They have been living there for over four months and evicting them now would either require the order of the deputy commissioner or the court,” he said.

He added, “Some 600 houses were set on fire evicting 2,500 people in a preplanned attack on Sunday by some local influential and police.”

He also demanded a fair judicial probe into the incident, as “police, local administration, and local government representatives were involved in it.”

“Most of the people, including women and children of the families are living under the sky in acute crises of food,” he said.

Part of Sunday's eviction, which was filmed by a bystander, went viral on social media where some people in plain clothes were seen torching the houses in the presence of policemen.

The families took shelter at Sahebganj, Joypurhat and Madarpur villages of Sapmara union in the upazila after their eviction.