The bharalu being dredged in guwahati on saturday. Picture by UB photos

Guwahati, July 19: Assam chief minister Tarun Gogoi today ordered an inquiry to identify the officials involved in illegal and arbitrary allotment of land in Guwahati metropolitan area, amid the eviction drive to free the city’s water bodies from encroachment.

Gogoi, who had earlier ordered the eviction drive against the illegal settlers on water bodies, today asked chief secretary Jitesh Khosla to conduct an inquiry by retired IAS officer Bhaskar Baruah and take action accordingly.

“The terms of reference of the inquiry would be to identify the officials involved in illegal and arbitrary allotment/settlement of land in Guwahati, especially in the wetlands and water bodies,” an official statement said.

The chief minister also directed the setting up of a committee, comprising experts from IIT Roorkee and IIT Guwahati, among others, to study the flash flood problem and suggest remedies.

The committee comprises N.K. Choudhury, former vice-chancellor of Gauhati University, Nayan Sarma of IIT Roorkee, Arup Kumar Sarma of the department of civil engineering of IIT Guwahati, Utpal Sarma of the Ahmedabad-based Centre for Environment Planning and Technology University, B.C. Kalita, former dean at Cotton College, A.K. Mitra, the chairman of the technical advisory committee of the water resources department and M. Angamuthu, the chief executive officer of GMDA.

The Kamrup (metro) district administration today launched an eviction drive in Borsola Beel to restore its normal water retention capacity.

The Guwahati Metropolitan Development Authority had yesterday asked illegal settlers or people occupying land on four water bodies — Silsako Beel, Deepor Beel, Borsola Beel and Sarusola Beel — to vacate the encroached land.

“All illegal settlements will be cleared before dredging the water bodies to restore their original water-retention capacity. These water bodies used to be reservoirs of rainwater but illegal construction and dumping has reduced their width and depth and heightened the flash floods problem,” development officer of GMDA, S. Alam, told The Telegraph today.

The GMDA yesterday said construction on the notified areas of the water bodies were illegal under the Guwahati Water Bodies (Preservation and Conservation) Act, 2008 and sections of Assam Land Grabbing (Prohibition) Act, 2012.

The eviction drive in the city began on June 30 following the death of nine persons in flash floods and landslides.