India, Bangladesh ease cross-border
travel By Syed Tashfin
Chowdhury
DHAKA - Two landmark deals
signed between India and Bangladesh this week
constitute a first step towards better connections
between the two countries and increased economic
ties, according to economists in Dhaka.
Other agreements may be reached between
the two countries by mid-February following visits
by then to Dhaka by three senior Indian government
officials.
Indian Home Minister Sushil
Kumar Shinde, while in Dhaka on Monday and
Tuesday, signed an extradition treaty and a
revised travel arrangements agreement with his
Bangladeshi counterpart, Mohiuddin Khan Alamgir,
at the end of bilateral talks on
cooperation between the two
governments to fight criminal activity and
terrorism in both countries.
"These
contracts will enhance ties in areas of security
and people-to-people contacts," Shinde told a
joint press conference after signing the deals.
The extradition treaty will also allow transfer of
the convicted and under-trial criminals.
India and Bangladesh are seeking to
improve how to tackle and manage issues related to
their shared 4,095-kilometer border, and the
latest steps continue a trend of improving ties
between the nations. Even so, several complex
issues remain outstanding, notably on trade and
personal cross-border transit, sharing of the
waters of the Teesta and Feni rivers, major
waterways that flow from India through Bangladesh,
and ratification of the Land Boundary Agreement,
which would lead to absorption of numerous Indian
and Bangladeshi enclaves on either side of the
border.
India is also seeking the use of
Mongla port on the western side of the Ganges
delta in Bangladesh and close to Kolkata, the
commercial capital of eastern India, and of
Chittagong port, in southeast Bangladesh, which
would considerably ease access to India's isolated
northeastern states. Bangladesh and India are also
working towards an arrangement that would permit
shippers to ply coastal trade in the other's
country.
Bangladeshi Cabinet Secretary
Mohammad Mosharraf Hossain Bhuiyan on Monday said
the extradition treaty would not be applicable for
people accused of "offenses of a political
nature", but will be applicable for those facing
charges such as murder, culpable homicide and
other serious offenses.
Delhi last week
approved the extradition treaty, which had been
proposed by Bangladesh. It follows commitments by
Delhi to track down two absconding and convicted
killers of Bangladesh's first president and later
prime minister, Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman,
and hand them over to Dhaka. Government officials
in Dhaka believe that the two killers are hiding
in India.
India, meanwhile, is seeking the
deportation of Anup Chetia, general secretary of
the United Liberation Front of Asom, a banned
northeast Indian separatist group that wants to
establish a sovereign Assam. He was arrested in
Bangladesh in 1997 and sentenced to seven years in
jail for being in the country without valid travel
documents. Chetia, who has continued to be
detained since completing his sentence in 2004,
has sought asylum in Bangladesh for security
reasons, making it legally difficult for Dhaka to
execute Delhi's demand.
Bangladesh Home Minister
Alamgir told reporters while visiting India last
month that "Bangladesh will keep its pledge",
made during a 2011 visit to Dhaka
by Indian home minister P Chidambaram,
that Bangladesh will do everything within its
abilities to return individuals India is seeking,
"[but] the matter [of Chetia] is now pending
before a court".
Last week, Alamgir said
that the extradition treaty specifically provides
for handing over of criminals, but political
asylum seekers "are a different category",
bdnews24.com reported. The Supreme Court in
Bangladesh will first have to dispose of the case,
he said.
Chetia is on
the top of a list sent to Dhaka in 2011 of 50
Indian nationals Delhi is seeking to have
deported. On its part, Dhaka has listed 100
Bangladeshi nationals it suspects are hiding in
India. An extradition treaty was required in order
to make such exchanges happen legally.
"The extradition treaty will now act as a
legal framework that will make it easier for both
countries to combat terrorism and criminal
activities," Delwar Hossain, professor and
chairman of the Department of International
Relations of the University of Dhaka told Asia
Times Online.
Home ministry officials in
Delhi said the extradition treaty will help the
deportation of Chetia and others opposed to the
Indian central government, including Tripura
insurgent leader Vishwa Mohan Deb Barman, National
Democratic Front of Bodoland leader Thulunga,
alias Tensu Narzery, and other insurgents from
northeast India who have been hiding in
Bangladesh.
Under the "revised travel
arrangements" agreement, there will no longer be
restrictions on visits between the two countries
by business people, tourists, journalists,
professionals, officials, students, patients,
citizens aged more than 65 years, children below
12 years, and those in medical categories.
Under the student visa, a person can now
be issued with a one-year multiple-entry travel
document. India has also agreed to waive a 60-day
cooling off period for the second visit by a
Bangladeshi national. The restriction is at
present applicable to citizens of Pakistan, China
and some other countries.
"This is good
start towards better connectivity between the two
nations," Mustafizur Rahman, executive director at
the Centre for Policy Dialogue in Dhaka told Asia
Times Online. "But more liberalization is required
to ensure mutual trade and economic development."
Two secretaries and another minister from
India are scheduled to visit Dhaka over the next
three weeks. Indian Power Secretary P Uma Shankar
was to land in Dhaka on a two-day visit on January
30 to strike a joint venture deal towards setting
up a 1,320 megawatt coal-fired power plant in
Rampal, Bagerhaat district, in Bangladesh. A
memorandum of understanding for establishing the
plant was signed between the two countries on
January 10.
On February 9, Indian Foreign
Secretary Ranjan Mathai will visit Dhaka for three
days to join the Foreign Office Consultations
(FOC) between India and Bangladesh. The previous
FOC was held in New Delhi last July.
Finally, from February 16 till 18, Indian
External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid will
visit Dhaka to attend the second meeting of the
India-Bangladesh Joint Consultative Commission,
whose first meeting was held in New Delhi last May
7. Last week, Bangladesh's foreign ministry
officials were quoted by Financial Express in
Dhaka as saying that they are yet to plan agenda
what will be discussed during Khurshid's visit.
Syed Tashfin Chowdhury is the
Editor of Xtra, the weekend magazine of New Age,
in Bangladesh.
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