Land swapping deal creates confusion
The coloured flags flying on a stretch of about 3 km in between Lathitilla and Dumabari divide territory of India with Bangladesh in Karimganj, a frontier district of southern Assam.
Even the state administration does not have record to substantiate as to why a stretch of 3 km border was not demarcated where nearly 94 acres of Indian land is at stake.
There have been many occasions that the border dispute created trouble in the area and resident of the area from both India and Bangladesh submitted representation to the government to settle the dispute and demarcate the border.
In the land-swapping deal signed between India and Bangladesh recently, the border is said to have been demarcated.
However, the Border Security Force does not have any official information on dispute being settled through the land-swapping agreement between India and Bangladesh so it has been holding the area, which it had been manning so far.
The records available with BSF suggested that sector commanders of two countries on February 8, 1966 created a military working boundary, which has been treated as border, separated by flags. The undemarcated border falls in between border pillar number 1397 and 1400/RI. The sector commanders also consider middle of a water stream known as Puthichera Nala as working border.
The confusion has gripped the residents and landowners of the area also as they do not know if military working boundary would remain the border or some deviation is going to take place. Landowners are worried about the fate of their fertile lands as there have been reports of India giving up lands to Bangladesh in process of settling the border dispute.
The BSF also admitted that the stretch of undemarcated boundary has been a major area of concern as it always excites criminals to use the territory to cross over. In fact, the menace of shifting rivers and mapping errors have also been areas of concern.
Security sources in Karimganj said that the joint survey team of India and Bangladesh had also failed to reach any consensus on the undemarcated stretch of border between the two countries.
but the land-swapping deal was signed and New Delhi claims to have succeeded in demarcating the border.
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