People in Chattogram today staged a demonstration protesting "hill land grabbing" to construct a five-star hotel and tourist spot in Chimbuk hill area in Bandarban.

More than one hundred people from several organisations also demanded stop to the grabbing of hills, our Chattogram staff correspondent reports.

During the demonstration, the protesters alleged that 'Sikder Group' is trying to grab about 1,000 acres of jhum land from Kapru Para Bazar to Jiban Nagar in the name of constructing a hotel and a tourist spot.

They also said the initiative will leave around 10,000 jhum cultivators landless which will directly affect six villages of Mro community and indirectly affect another 70 to 116 villages.

More than one hundred people from several organisations in Chattogram city have protested grabbing on Chimbuk hill in Bandarban district on Friday, November 13, 2020. Photo: Rajib Raihan

Dr Mahfuzur Rahman, chairman of Bangladesher Mukti Sangram O Muktijuddho Gobeshona Kendra said, "Indigenous people have made an important contribution to the Liberation War of independent Bangladesh. Keeping in view the ideology of the country's Liberation War, they should have rights and the construction of the hotel and tourist spot should be stopped immediately."

Advocate Bhulan Bhowmik, president of Jatio Mukti Council at Chattogram-3, said. "The construction of a five-star hotel on the Chimbuk hill in Bandarban was not an isolated incident. It is part of a deeper conspiracy to wipe out the Jumma people in the Chittagong Hill Tracts."

Dr Sushant Barua, member secretary of Jono Shastho Odhikar Porishod said,"I am fully supporting the movement started by Mro community to protect against hill land grabbers."

Subarna Mazumder, assistant professor at Chattogram University, Hasan Maruf Rumi coordinator of Gonosanghati Andolon and Miton Chakma, general secretary of PCC, were present during the demonstration.