TDS Desk:

The Forest Department on Monday recovered a total of 55 acres of land grabbed by the brother of former Foreign Minister Hasan Mahmud at Rangunia upazila in the district.

Sources said Hasan’s younger brother Arshad Mahmud developed a restaurant, dairy sheds and fish farming keeping a total of 220 acres of forest land under his clutch over the last 16 years.

The Forest Department reclaimed the land at village Sukhbilash under Padua union of the upazila in a drive conducted from 10:00am to 4:00pm.

Officials said 50 acres of forest land was illegally occupied by Arshad in the hilly area under the Khorushia range and six cow sheds were developed there.

He was also doing fish farming by digging three ponds. Apart from this, another five acres of land owned by the Forest Department in the Dashmile area along Bandarban road was kept occupied, and a restaurant and pond were built there, they said.

Chattogram Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) Abdullah Al Mamun said all the structures developed on the 55 acres of occupied land were demolished during the drive.

The banks of all the ponds have been cut to drain out the water, he said.

Arshad occupied a total of 220 acres of forest land and those will be recovered gradually, the DFO said, adding that afforestation will be carried out in the recovered land.