The first signs of such progress were visible when inter riverine traffic started between India and Bangladesh. This enabled India to dispatch heavy equipment by the river route through Bangladesh from Haldia port to Tripura, for the building of the gas-based 800 MW Palatana power plant. Later, some 20,000 tonnes of rice was sent to Tripura along the same route.

As a promising follow up to this first step, came an agreement to ensure better co-ordination and co-operation in the power sector between the two countries. Currently, Bangladesh gets 1000 MW of power from India, routed from West Bengal and Tripura. This has helped Dhaka in meeting its daily power shortfall, an estimated 500 MW, to some extent. However, co-operation in this sector is poised to grow exponentially in the years ahead.

The demand for power in Bangladesh to serve its rapid industrial growth will be around 24000 MW by 2020.Before that, Bangladesh will import more power from India, from Palatana and the Northeastern grid. In addition India will help Bangladesh set up its proposed 1320 MW power plant at Bagerhat following a definite timeline, as a joint venture. Indian companies will also set up more power units in Bangladesh, which is acquiring at least two nuclear power reactors from Russia, to be put up at Rooppur and elsewhere.

The third step in the regional economic integration is the ambitious road transport connectivity project as envisaged in the recently concluded BBIN (Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Nepal) agreement, due to take effect from February/March this year. This enables India to reduce the distance from Kolkata to Agartala and other parts of the Northeast by around 600 to 900 kilometres, avoiding the lengthy North Bengal-Assam-Nagaland-Manipur-Meghalaya detour.

Quite apart from the problems of sabotage and insurgency, the terrain of the roads was not easy, running long stretches of hills and valleys. This made the movement of industrial equipment very difficult especially during the long monsoon, time consuming and expensive — major factors that explain the relative lack of development in the NE states.

The fourth phase will see the joining of Myanmar and Thailand with the BBIN linkage in the region shortly. This would bring together an economically emergent South Asia and the already developed Southeast Asia for the first time.

No wonder there is much talk these days of people now being able to drive directly from Delhi to Singapore eventually, with the growth of existing road linkages. More importantly the movement of goods and industrial items between the SA and SEA regions in one seamless motion will certainly promote more trade, business, imports, exports and tourism, apart from generating jobs.

As a Kolkata-based economist says,’ The road , river and rail connectivity, which is being developed between India, Bangladesh and Myanmar will automatically bring about the emergence and later growth of ,a buzzing economic corridor, which should prove the strongest antidote against even the longest enduring insurgency problems in the region as a whole.’

Within India, in addition to Tripura and the NE states, which will certainly see a quantum jump in their economic growth, West Bengal should also benefit in a major way. This has been already stated at length by India’s former Foreign Secretary Mr, Rajan Mathai, when he visited Kolkata and other parts in East India. He made it clear that as a city, Kolkata would certainly regain much of its lost economic weightage and importance. in effect, Kolkata should partly recover from the loss of its economic hinterland of East Pakistan resulting from the country’s partition in 1947.

Fortunes of the Kolkata-Haldia port complex, which reported a good volume of business and activity during the last fiscal, is bound to improve through the proposed construction of the New Sagar Port.

As the fifth step, Indian and Bangladesh ships will access Chittagong, Mongla, Haldia and Paradip ports directly with their cargo. This would reduce much cost and travelling time, avoiding the despatching of receiving of goods through Colombo and Singapore ports by almost 30 days, because of earlier international formalities. This should substantially reduce fuel costs and higher operational expenses like high berthing, loading and unloading charges. While India is helping the development of the two Bangladeshi ports, Nepal is also interested in making more use of the Chittagong port.

In fact, the BBIN agreement should prove a win-win situation for all participating countries, Bangladesh can access Nepal and Bhutan directly through West Bengal, avoiding the long detour. Nepal and Bhutan can access Bangladesh the same way, giving them alternate routes for exports by using the Bangladeshi ports. Also, Bangladesh can access India’s Northeastern states directly, setting up establishments in Guwahati and Tripura shortly, to increase the level of existing trade and business.

More encouragingly, talks for the proposed 900 kilometres long Myanmar-Bangladesh-India gas pipeline project has been revived. It may be recalled that a trilateral interaction over the project had been scuppered at the last moment in 2005 by then Bangladesh Prime Minister, BNP leader Khaleda Zia. She had asked for several major concessions from Delhi, such as road transit through India for Bangladesh to Nepal and Bhutan, without assuring much in return.

The present BBIN agreement grants that right to Dhaka automatically. Awami League Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina does not regard India as Dhaka’s enemy number one. Myanmar, which was upset by the last minute collapse of the talks, had pledged much if its supply from a rich off-source field to China instead. But now that new reserves in the Bay of Bengal have been located, it is keen to rejoin the dialogue with India and Bangladesh.

The regional connectivity has been mutually agreed between India and Bangladesh is fast becoming a reality. India has understandably stepped in to fulfill what it sees as its neigbours’s long term economic needs. The issue figured prominently during talks held between Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Sheikh Hasina, Bangladesh Prime Minister, when the former visited Dhaka.

It has been agreed that Indian Railways would assist Bangladesh expand and improve its rail network , upgrade its rolling stock and help build bridges . India is already engaged in similar work in some areas in Myanmar, although progress has been somewhat slow there. Bangladesh has also sought india’s help in building the massive new Rail-cum-road bridge over the Padma river, which it has decided to build at its own cost, rejecting World Bank assistance

There has also been progress in the proposed energy grid and link .Soon, the Numaligarh Refinery limited would supply Bangladesh with 10 lakh tonnes of HSD (gas oil). It would be routed through a 135 kilometres long pipeline. Of this, there would be only seven Kms on the Indian side. Supply would be made from Rangapani at Siliguri in India to Parbatipur in north Bangladesh. (IPA Service)