The Assam government has tabled different figures regarding alleged land encroachment by neighbouring states on two different days in the assembly.
Border Area Development Minister Atul Bora on Wednesday said that 71 incidents of encroachment of Assam’s land by neighbouring states have taken place in the last five years.
Bora shared the data in a written reply to a question raised by Congress MLA Nandita Das.
However, on the first day of the Budget Session on Monday, Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma had said that a total of 209 instances of encroachment of Assam’s land have taken place since 2016, when the BJP-led government came to power for the first time.
Sarma, who also holds the Home portfolio, was replying to an unstarred query by the Leader of the Opposition Debabrata Saikia.
A senior government official, when approached for clarification, said that the matter will be looked into.
Both the replies by the two ministers mentioned that these encroachments were carried out by the people of Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Mizoram and Meghalaya.
Though Sarma did not mention how much of Assam’s land has been encroached so far, Bora said that a total of 69,010.82 hectares of land have been occupied by the four neighbouring states.
The chief minister said that two separate cases against Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh are going on in the Supreme Court to settle the border disputes. (PTI)
