The External Affairs Minister of India, S Jaishankar, concluded his short and significant visit to Bangladesh last week to invite Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to India and also meet his counterpart, AK Abdul Momen, for discussing various bilateral issues as both nations take steps to move forward after disruptions due to COVID-19. One of the major takeaways of the visit is the offer to use the Chittagong port.
The offer, made by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, would be of benefit to India’s northeastern states, particularly Assam and Tripura. This is very significant as for a long time, the need for the connectivity of mainland India to the northeast via Bangladesh through a multi-modal approach was being felt. Efforts to improve capacity across waterways, roadways and railroads were undertaken in close consultations; in the last couple of years, trial runs and transshipments have also been successfully conducted.
A 1,879-kilometre Shared Border
One of the major areas where bilateral engagements have increased between India and Bangladesh in the last five years is connectivity, and the northeast region in India is key to that. Four northeastern states – Assam, Tripura, Mizoram and Meghalaya – share a 1,879-kilometre border with Bangladesh. Despite this significant length across land and water, the potential for economic activities has not been explored optimally.
That has partly been due to a sense of mistrust and also because of not looking at trade and commerce opportunities more closely. But with the signing of the historic land boundary agreement in May 2015, much of the mistrust has gone, and a new sense of cooperation is being fostered.
Further, India’s ‘Act East’ policy, which aims at focusing on northeastern states, finds the most visible forms of action on the ground when it comes to the India-Bangladesh border across locations. Clearly, enhancing connectivity by building infrastructure to support formal trade and commerce and increasing tourism have been key goals. Railways and waterways have found special focus, and many of the trade routes that were in place in the pre-Partition days and even till a few years after Independence, particularly till the 1965 war, are now being revived.
In this context, the availability of the Chittagong port for usage by India is very crucial. Historically, the northeastern region was fed by the port. In undivided India, Chittagong was one of the largest ports for trade and commerce in the region. The colonial administrators emphasised building the Assam-Bengal Railway route to ship goods from the Chittagong port to faraway areas of the northeast, including the now-defunct Lekhapani station in upper Assam.
Connectivity Is High on Agenda
Much of the trade from the northeastern region to the various parts of the world, besides Indian ports, can happen through Chittagong, which can be a revenue-earner for Bangladesh. An infrastructural boost in the northeastern region will facilitate the movement of goods to the port through multi-modal routes.
With investments coming to the northeastern region by way of the North East Industrial Development Scheme (NEIDS), which also incentivises entrepreneurs and businesses with air and rail subsidies, many of those products can be shipped via Chittagong.
If both these aspects are factored in, there will be benefits not only in terms of saving cost and time but also in establishing a healthy, formal business relationship between India and Bangladesh.
In March 2021, the Prime Ministers of the two countries inaugurated the bridge ‘Maitri Setu’ built over the Feni river, which has reduced the distance between Sabroom in southern Tripura and the Chittagong port to just 111 kilometres; the distance can now be covered in about three hours; in effect, the distance between Agartala and Chittagong port can be covered in about seven hours. The distance between Karimganj to Sabroom is 336 km, which could be covered in 10 hours. With Sabroom being connected by road and rail, the possibility of sending goods from various parts in the northeast to Sabroom and then to the Chittagong port will significantly change the face of trade. Already, the Indian government is working to set up a multi-modal transit hub at Sabroom.
Growing Cooperation Between Indian States and Bangladesh
The recent visit of the Commerce Minister of Bangladesh, Tipu Munshi, to Mizoram is another positive development. In February this year, many Mizoram trade associations demanded the revival of the waterway connection with Bangladesh over the Khawthilangtuipui/Karnaphuli river. The minister also visited Silsuri in Mamit district, which shares the border with Sajek (considered one of the most important tourist destinations in Bangladesh), and laid the foundation stone to build a border haat. The distance from Silsuri to the Chittagong port will be about 394 km via the Chittagong hill tracts.
Both governments also released joint statements, wherein Mizoram agreed to urge New Delhi to declare Karnaphuli river as one of the Protocol of Inland Water Transit and Trade (PIWTT) routes and also agreed to construct bridges over the Khawthlangtuipui/Karnaphuli river to improve connectivity.
The significance of the river routes as a cost-effective means to transport goods to the northeastern region has been for some time and both countries bilaterally took steps to fructify it. Thus, efforts to connect the Barak and Brahmaputra rivers in Assam with the Meghna Basin and the Gomati in Tripura and Khawthilangtuipui in Mizoram to Chittagong have been pursued. Dredging work on the Barak river in Assam has been undertaken, and it is being extended further to Manipur, eventually connecting Manipur with Bangladesh. About 40 km of the 90-km stretch from Sonamura in Tripura’s Sepahijala district to Daudkandi in Bangladesh is being dredged, with 80% cost-support from the Indian side, to increase the water level.
Earlier in March this year, the first of the four cargo ships reached the Pandu port near Guwahati from Patna through Bangladesh, covering a distance of 2,350 km along the India-Bangladesh Protocol Route (IBPR) as per the Protocol of Inland Water Transit and Trade (PIWTT) signed in 1972. The vessel brought 200MT of foodgrains from Patna. Back in 2020, a cargo ship carrying about 50 MT of materials, mainly cement from Bangladesh, sailed to Tripura through the Gomati River. Around the same time of the year, the first pilot project cargo vessel reached Karimganj in Assam from Ashuganj in Bangladesh via the Kushiara River.
Dawki, Sutarkandi and Akhaura Roads
Apart from waterways and railways, improving road connectivity is also being pursued. Meghalaya’s Dawki, Assam’s Sutarkandi and Tripura’s Akhaura are the three top border roads connecting the east and the southeast of Bangladesh, and even the border haat markets. The Agartala to Akhaura rail link, which is near completion, and the proposed Mahisasan to Shahbazpur railway link, will help boost Assam, Tripura, Manipur and Mizoram’s connectivity to Bangladesh.
Clearly, the efforts on the ground to bolster connectivity are moving at a steady pace. The outreach of the northeastern states’ governments to Bangladesh has also been reciprocated very well. The Bangladesh Prime Minister has herself communicated with many of the Chief Ministers of the northeastern states, and regular visits are being held among ministers and officials. Trade and tourism will be trendsetters for the future in this bilateral relationship involving the northeastern region of India.
(Subimal Bhattacharjee is a commentator on cyber and security issues around northeast India. He can be reached @subimal on Twitter. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)
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