Hasina to discuss transit issue with India during visit

Dhaka: Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is likely to visit India later this month when the politically contentious issue of giving transit facility to India through Bangladesh territory will be discussed, a newspaper said on Thursday.

Bangladesh Foreign Minister Dipu Moni's talks with the Indian leadership last month may have paved the ground for the visit of Sheikh Hasina, the New Age said. Dhaka agreed to allow New Delhi to use Bangladesh territory to carry goods to Tripura in northeast India during a meeting between Dipu Moni and her Indian counterpart S.M. Krishna in New Delhi September 8.

New Delhi has also long been pressing for a transit right through Bangladesh to carry goods to and from the northeast and has offered to invest in the development of necessary infrastructure. Indian authorities are yet to make any concrete financial offer regarding its investment in building the required infrastructure, unnamed sources in the Bangladesh foreign ministry told the newspaper.

The two countries are scheduled to sign a deal in May 2010 on India's access to the Ashuganj Port in Bangladesh that it wants to use to transport heavy equipment for a power plant in Tripura.

Former prime minister and opposition leader Khaleda Zia has already voiced her opposition to the move, resurrecting old fears that India could "exercise control" over Bangladesh's infrastructure facilities.

Foreign policy experts interviewed by the newspaper expressed diverse opinion on the issue that is being intensely debated politically. Many have suggested that Bangladesh should mobilise its own resources to invest in roads, railways and ports instead of allowing India to participate in their building.

Bangladesh will need an investment of $2.4 billion for building infrastructure to effectively join the Asian Highway network, including transit to India, which would link Bulgaria in Europe to Philippines in Southeast Asia, according to a study by the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

"We should thoroughly examine the requirements and modes of investments for a better regional connectivity. It is a question of our national interests, pride and dignity to develop our own infrastructures and I think we should afford the costs," former foreign secretary Shamsher Mobin Chowdhury said.

Imtiaz Ahmed, professor of international relations at Dhaka University, added that New Delhi realised that cooperation with Bangladesh was essential to develop the country, particularly its northeast region. "So, we should try to cash in on India's compulsion. We should think about long-term funding to establish regional connectivity, not merely India connectivity," he said.

Mostafa Faruk Mohammad, a former diplomat who is now a lawmaker and a member of the parliamentary standing committee on the foreign ministry, however, did not see any problem in receiving Indian funds.

"What is wrong if we take Indian investment as we are having investments from countries such as China and Japan in transport infrastructures?" he asked.

M. Rahmatullah, a former transport expert with the UN, pointed out that no concrete assurance of funding was in sight either from international financing institutions or private investors for developing road, rail and other connectivity.

"We need not invest money right now in establishing connectivity with India," he said.