MUHURIGHAT - Bangladesh has urged India to do away with visas for travel between the two neighbours to boost trade and business besides improving people-to-people relations.
“If European nations introduced visa free movement among 27 of their countries, why aren’nt southeast Asia’s two close neighbours — India and Bangladesh — adopting such systems to further boost economy and culture?” asked Bangladesh Ports and Shipping Minister Shahjahan Khan.
“Dhaka has been asking New Delhi to launch a visa free system so that traders, businessmen, students, professionals, patients and other people of India and Bangladesh can move freely between the two friendly countries,” Khan said.
Earlier, he flagged off the export-import business through the new Muhurighat-Belonia land port stations along the India-Bangladesh border, 120 km south of Tripura capital Agartala, late Sunday.
Tripura’s Commerce and Industry Minister Jitendra Chowdhury, Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Pinak Ranjan Chakraborty, Bangladesh Shipping Secretary Masud Elahi, India-Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry president Abdul Matlub Ahmed were among those present at the event.
Chakraborty agreed that blurring the borders was important and noted that India has been liberally issuing visas to Bangladeshis.
Quoting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Chakraborty said: “Let us make border irrelevant. SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) countries should be borderless like European nations.”
“India has been issuing visas to Bangladeshi citizens liberally. New Delhi and Dhaka are now discussing to provide five years’ business visa and other different visas to each other’s people…,” he said.
Exporters and importers from Chittagong, Noakhali and Feni regions in Bangladesh and northeast India would be able to transport their goods at very low costs and minimum time through the new port, say both Indian and Bangladesh officials.
The Muhurighat-Belonia land port station is just 100 km from Chittagong international sea port in southeast Bangladesh.
Chowdhury said cement, stone chips, other construction material, processed food, beverages, utensils and clothes come to India’s northeastern states from Bangladesh. And bamboo, value-added bamboo products, Indian clothes, dry fish and fruits, and spare parts are expected to be exported to Bangladesh in larger quantities.
“The governments of the northeastern states have been demanding transit through Bangladesh for transporting men and materials to the rest of the country and vice-versa and access to the Chittagong, Ashuganj and other Bangladeshi ports for carrying heavy goods to the region,” Chowdhury said.
“After commissioning of some under-construction power projects, the northeastern states can supply electricity to the power-starved bordering region of Bangladesh,” the Tripura minister added.
“New Delhi and Dhaka would develop infrastructure along the border and simplify trade barriers to boost business between Bangladesh and northeast India,” said Bangladesh Shipping Secretary Masud Elahi.
Bangladesh and India would upgrade existing infrastructural facilities of 27 Land Customs Stations (LCS) in the four northeastern states of Assam, Tripura, Meghalaya and Mizoram - which share a 1,879-km border with Bangladesh. Of the 27 LCS, 14 are now operational.
According to an official of the Export Promotion Bureau of Bangladesh, Dhaka had a trade gap with New Delhi worth $1.58 billion in the 2008-09 fiscal.
“We are hopeful that Bangladesh will export goods worth $1 billion to India’s northeast alone by 2011,” said India-Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry president Abdul Matlub Ahmed.
“Efforts are on to set up 100 joint venture industries in Bangladesh with a view to encourage transfer of technology and re-export of goods to India,” he said.
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