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Akhaura Rail Link

Indian govt allocates Rs 267cr

REZAUL KARIM
The Indian government has sanctioned Rs 267 crore for construction of a new railway link between India's Agartala and Akhaura in Bangladesh.
Diplomatic sources said the sanction was made following the agreement between the prime ministers of the two countries in January 2010.
The joint communique issued on January 12 last year during Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's state visit to India said it was agreed that “the construction of the proposed Akhaura-Agartala railway link be financed by grant from India."
After a lengthy technical and financial survey to identify the alignment for
connectivity, experts suggested construction of a 15-kilometre railway track connecting Agartala of Tripura state with Akhaura.
Of the 15-km rail line, five km falls in India and the rest in Bangladesh.
Officials in Dhaka said India will bear the entire cost of the project that is expected to be completed by 2014.
They said the main objective of the project is to establish India's connection with Chittagong seaport, Sylhet and Dhaka. It will also facilitate easier communication between the northeastern region and Kolkata through Ban-
gladesh.
According to Tripura government officials, the Indian Railway Construction Company (IRCON) would lay the new railway tracks on both sides of the border.
Of the total cost, Rs 146.34 crore is expected to be provided by the external affairs ministry to lay the 10-km new track on the Bangladesh side. The remaining cost is likely to be borne by the Development of North Eastern Region ministry.
Tripura officials said with the establishment of the new rail route, northeastern India would be connected to Chittagong
seaport.
According to officials, there were seven to eight old rail links between India's Paschimbanga (former West Bengal) and Assam states and Bangladesh [then East Pakistan], but the services were suspended after the Indo-Pak war, 1965.
Presently, only three rail links are operational between Paschimbanga and Bangladesh, they said.
Diplomatic sources say surface connectivity is crucial for India as its northeastern states are surrounded by Bangladesh, Myanmar, Bhutan and China.
The only land route to
the landlocked region from the rest of India is through Assam and Paschimbanga and falls in hilly terrain with steep roads and multiple hairpin bends.
For ferrying goods and heavy machinery from abroad and other parts of the country, India has for long been seeking land, port and rail access to the northeast through Bangladesh.
Agartala, for instance, is 1,650km from Kolkata and 2,637km from New Delhi via Guwahati and Paschimbanga, whereas the distance between the Tripura capital and Kolkata via Bangladesh is just about 350km.