India and Bangladesh have agreed in principle to sign as many as five bilateral agreements during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Dhaka visit next month.
Published : 18 May 2015, 09:57 PM
“We would try to ink agreements on power, shipping, road transport and a few others during the forthcoming visit of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Bangladesh,” Bangladesh Minister for Road Transport and Bridges Obaidul Quader told a select group of journalists in New Delhi on Monday.
“We are, in fact, trying to finalise the Bangladesh-Bhutan-India-Nepal (BBIN) Motor Vehicle Agreement before his Dhaka visit,” he said.
Quader said Modi might also flag off the Guwahati-Shillong-Dhaka bus service during his visit.
The bus service had a trial run a few weeks back. “We will go for another trial run on May 22, and hope by that this time we will be able to finalise the date of its operation,” Quader said.
The visiting Bangladesh minister called on India’s Road and Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari and discussed the modalities of a few agreements.
“My talk with the Indian minister was very fruitful…this is a new era of constructive partnership. Let us remove the walls of distrust and build bridges of relation,” Quader said.
He also thanked the Indian government for the passage of the land boundary agreement. “This was really a big achievement for us,” said Quader.
The issue of connecting India’s north-eastern states to Kolkata via Bangladesh was also discussed by the two ministers.
“We are considering a bus service between Kolkata-Dhaka-Agartala. We will also try to flag off this bus service during Modi’s visit,” Quader said.
In fact, a few Indian chief ministers including West Bengal’s Mamata Banerjee and Tripura’s Manik Sarkar had earlier proposed a Kolkata-Agartala road link via Bangladesh.
West Bengal’s transport secretary Alapon Bandopadhay was also present at Monday’s meeting.
The two leaders also explored some new bus routes between both the countries.
“We have discussed on Kolkata-Chittagong, Shillong-Chittagong, Khulna-Kolkata and Jeshore-Kolkata bus services,” the minister said.
Quader also said that a survey for the construction of a bridge across the Feni River had already been completed.
“Construction will begin soon. We will develop a land port on our side,” Quader said.
The minister said that as a second line of credit from India, Bangladesh would like to have 500 trucks, 300 double-deckers and 100 articulated buses. “It’s just a proposal,” he added.
In 2010, India offered $1 billion as the first credit line to Bangladesh for 15 projects.
Out of that $200 million was converted into grants in “reciprocation to the cooperation” received from Bangladesh in dealing with terrorism and insurgency since Sheikh Hasina came back to power.
Quader said he was impressed by India’s metro train service. “We have to learn a lot from the Indian metro system while implementing Dhaka metro rail,” he said.
The Bangladesh government is implementing a metro rail project funded by Japan’s development funding arm JICA.