Residents of four villages located along the India-Bangladesh border in the Sadar block of Jalpaiguri district have shown a willingness to part with their agricultural plots for the installation of fences and construction of a road along the frontier while underscoring the need to get their land records updated.

“Our villages were in ‘adverse possession’ and hence, the land records continue to remain in the names of our fathers and grandfathers. That is why the administration could not acquire the land from us and hand it over to the BSF. We want the administration to immediately update the records and facilitate the acquisition process,” said Dwijendranath Roy, a resident of Boroshoshi, one of the four villages, around 40kmfrom here.

The villagers shed their opposition to the land acquisition following the downfall of the Sheikh Hasina government in Bangladesh. After Hasina’s exit, hundreds of Bangladeshis, mostly Hindus, reached the zero point near their villages and sought shelter in India.

The BSF, along with the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB), managed to sendthem back.

In Jalpaiguri Sadar block, the border is unfenced for a stretch of 13km. The four villages which were in “adverse possession” are located along the unfenced border.

In 1947, the four villages remained in the Indian territory but were marked on the map of the then East Pakistan and later, Bangladesh. When the land boundary agreement was signed between India and Bangladesh in 2015, the villages were formally marked on the Indian map.

“Our land records are not updated even after the 2015 agreement... Considering the present state of affairs in Bangladesh, we want fences to come up in our villages,” said Anil Roy, another resident of Boroshoshi.

He pointed out that until and unless the land records were in their names, the administration couldn’t pay compensation to them.

“The state should either do mutation (change of names in land records) of our land in our name or else, announce the land as vest land and provide ‘pattas (secured land tenure) to us,” said Palen Roy, another villager.

Around 3,000 residents of the four villages will organise a rally in Jalpaiguri town on August 27 and submit a memorandum to the district magistrate and the district land and land reforms department. The memorandum will have demands for changes in land records, early acquisition of plots and installation of fences.