The building being bulldozed in Bangladesh’s Mymensingh district has no historical or family links to filmmaker Satyajit Ray, Dhaka claimed on Thursday amid a row over its demolition.

Bangladesh’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that after a “detailed inquiry” into the archival records it was found that the building is not related to Satyajit Ray or his ancestors.

On Wednesday, the Bangladesh government had halted the demolition of the century-old house, located on Harikishore Ray Chowdhury Road in Mymensingh, following public outcry, The Daily Star reported.

In its statement on Thursday, the Bangladeshi government said that the district authorities had established that the land belongs to the government.

“Local senior citizens and…individuals from various communities also attested that there is no known historical connection between the Ray family and the house and land currently leased to the Shishu Academy,” it stated.

The road in front of the house – Harikishore Ray Road – is named after Satyajit Ray’s great-grandfather, the government said.

“The Ray family had a house on HariKishore Ray Road, which they had sold long ago and thus no longer exists,” the ministry stated. A multi-storied building was constructed there by the new owner, it added.

The structure being demolished was dilapidated, risky and unusable, the ministry added.

On Tuesday, The Daily Star reported that the ancestral home of littérateur Upendrakishore Ray Chowdhury was being demolished to make way for a “new semi-concrete structure”. Chowdhury is the grandfather of Satyajit Ray and father of poet Sukumar Ray.

The home had been abandoned for 10 years and was being used as the Mymensingh Shishu Academy, the newspaper had reported.

The property was being demolished to build a semi-concrete structure with several rooms to start activities of the academy, the newspaper had quoted the district children affairs officer as saying.

The official had claimed that the old structure posed “safety risks” for the children gathering in the compound.

After reports emerged about the demolition, India had said on Tuesday that it was willing to cooperate with the Bangladeshi government in repairing and reconstructing Satyajit Ray’s ancestral home.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee had also sought the intervention of both New Delhi and Dhaka in the matter.