From the point of view of trade relation, India and Bangladesh have deep business relations. Bangladesh is the sixth largest business partner of India. Now know how important this pipeline project is.
The relations between the two countries will further deepen with this project.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi And Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will inaugurate the Indo-Bangladesh Friendship Pipeline through video conferencing on Saturday evening. It is called IBFPL in short, which is the short form of “India-Bangladesh Friendship Pipeline Project”. This is the first cross-border energy pipeline between the two countries. Through this international pipeline (IBFPP), fuel will be transported from the marketing terminal of Assam-based Numaligarh Refinery Limited (NRL) in Siliguri, West Bengal to the Parbatipur depot of Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC).
Please tell that NRL i.e. Numali Refinery Limited is the largest refinery company in the Northeast. What is this project, how much it costs, how much it is spread in both the countries, how it will be used and what will be its benefits… Let us know about it pointwise.
- What is project? It is the first cross border energy pipeline between India and Bangladesh. The Prime Ministers of India and Bangladesh had laid the foundation stone of this pipeline in September 2018. The length of this pipeline is about 130 km. About 125 km of the pipeline i.e. most part is in Bangladesh. Only five kilometer part falls in India.
- cost how much? This project is financed by India. The cost of this project is said to be around 377 crores. In this, about Rs 285 crore has been spent on the part of the upline built in Bangladesh, which has been borne by the Government of India under the grant.
- How useful will the project be? The capacity of this pipeline project is to transport 10 lakh metric tonnes of High Speed Diesel (HSD). Initially, this pipeline will supply high speed diesel to seven districts of northern Bangladesh.
- What would be the benefits? The India-Bangladesh Friendship Pipeline will establish a sustainable, reliable, economical and environment-friendly means of transportation of high speed diesel from India to Bangladesh. This will boost cooperation in energy security between the two countries.
Let us inform that Bangladesh had entered into an agreement in the year 2017 for the import of diesel. Till now Bangladesh used to import diesel from India through trains. At the same time, the already existing pipeline is only from Siliguri in West Bengal to Parvatipur Meghna Petroleum Depot in Dinajpur. Now there will be supply from the new pipeline. India has said that both countries will move forward in the field of energy.
Deep trade relations between the two countries
From the point of view of trade relation, India and Bangladesh have deep business relations. Bangladesh is the sixth largest business partner of India. Under the South Asian Free Trade Area (SAFTA), since 2011, India has given tariff-free quota to Bangladesh on all types of products except alcohol and tobacco. Bilateral trade between the two countries has also increased year by year.
In the year 2020-21, there was a trade of about US $ 10.8 billion between the two countries. This figure increased to US $ 18.2 billion in 2021-22 Agartala-Akhaura rail-link between the two countries is the first rail route between Northeast India and Bangladesh. Friendship Express has also started between the two countries.
