A video clip from a Gauhati High Court hearing has been raging across social media. It shows Justice Sanjay Kumar Medhi, visibly astonished, reacting to the allotment of 3,000 bighas of land in Assam’s Dima Hasao district to a private cement company.
“3,000 bighas! The entire district? What is going on? A private company being given 3,000 bighas? … Public interest, not private interest, is what matters,” Justice Medhi said during the August 12 hearing.
Online, though, the story took on another life. As the clip spread, many users, including the social media handles of the Congress and CPI(M), claimed that the land was being handed over to the Adani Group. The conglomerate had to issue a formal denial on August 18, clarifying that such reports are “baseless” and that it has no connection to the cement company.
After the misinformation and the subsequent clarification, the actual issue – the long-running conflict between tribal villagers and land allotments in Sixth Schedule areas – was once again sidelined.
Newslaundry had earlier reported on similar tribal resistance to other mining projects in the same district. One of them is linked to Adani Group’s Ambuja Cement, whose limestone mining project has been allotted over 1,200 bighas and has been facing stiff local opposition over fears of displacement.
A fight older than the viral clip
The company at the heart of the viral video is Mahabal Cement, which received the disputed allotment in Umrangso, an environmental hotspot in Dima Hasao district. Since December 2024, 22 residents of Nobdi Longku Kro and Chotolarpheng villages have been challenging the allotment in court. They have alleged that the Dima Hasao Autonomous Council (DAHC) had granted the land without following due process.
Dima Hasao, a Sixth Schedule district established in 1951, is governed by the North Cachar Hills Autonomous Council, which oversees land management and governance in the region, particularly for its tribal communities. The district has both surveyed and unsurveyed lands – land rights in the surveyed land are governed by the council and in line with traditional arrangements recognised by the revenue department in unsurveyed areas.
The petitioners claim their families have lawfully lived on and cultivated these lands since 1975, and have consistently paid taxes to the DAHC through village headmen, or gaon buras. The land, they argue, is communally owned under tribal customs and distributed among villagers by the gaon buras.
But in 2024, a revenue official informed them that their land had been acquired for a private company’s project. The patwari allegedly coerced some villagers into signing No Objection Certificates (NOCs) and accepting cheques of Rs 2 lakh as compensation, the petitioners claimed.
On May 16, a group from Nobdi Longku Kro submitted a formal objection letter to the DAHC, accusing officials of using “coercion” and “disinformation” to push through an “involuntary” acquisition.
While a section of villagers allege coercion, the case has seen at least nine hearings since February this year.
Three months before the villagers approached the court last year, the land dispute had reached the Gauhati High Court through a PIL filed by an activist on behalf of villagers. While the court disposed of the matter in November, allowing residents to return if new circumstances arose, tensions on the ground continued to escalate. A petition was filed in December.
The hearings
During the first hearing on February 2, the Gauhati High Court directed the authorities to clarify how 3,000 bighas of land, located near parcels owned by the petitioners, had been allotted to Mahabal Cement. The court also sought an update from the DAHC on the progress of land demarcation related to the allotment.
By April, the council submitted an affidavit acknowledging that a resolution passed in January had approved the provision of alternate land to affected residents. This was followed by a notification on March 6, confirming the re-allotment of land roughly 500 meters from the village, in equal proportion to what was acquired, along with monetary compensation for agricultural use.
Meanwhile, Mahabal Cement also filed a separate petition, alleging inaction on its complaint about individuals allegedly disrupting its cement project. The court later merged the petitions, hearing them jointly on August 12 when its remarks went viral.
The court noted: “A cursory glance into the facts of the case would reveal that the land which has been sought to be allotted is about 3,000 bighas, which itself appears to be extraordinary.”
While Mahabal Cement claimed that the land had been allotted following a mining lease granted through a tender process, the court raised serious concerns, pointing out that the district is a Sixth Schedule area “where the priority has to be given to the rights and interest of the tribal people residing there”. “The area involved is Umrangso in the district of Dima Hasao which is known as an environmental hotspot containing hot spring, stopover for migratory birds, wildlife, etc.”
The court will next hear the matter on September 1.
This article is republished from Newslaundry with permission.