Two bus services were flagged off by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee
olkata-Dhaka-Agartala and Dhaka-Shillong-Guwahati will link West Bengal to three North Eastern states of India via Dhaka. The services are aimed at improving people to people contact between the neighbouring countries.
There will be two buses on the Kolkata- Agartala route, one of which would be run by the Bengal government and the other by the Tripura government. The solo bus on the other route will be run by the Bangladesh government.
The Bengal- Tripura bus service reduces the distance between the states by 560 km.
In the flag off ceremony on the first day of Modi's visit, he handed over a symbolic ticket of the Agartala-Dhaka-Kolkata service to Hasina and she handed over a symbolic ticket of Dhaka-Shillong-Guwahati service to her Indian counterpart. Mamata gave Hasina a symbolic ticket of the Kolkata-Dhaka-Agartala service.
Mamata-Hasina bonhomie
Hitting bulls eye with his political timing, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's decision to only include Mamata Banerjee in his delegation has borne fruits. The most talked about minister to participate in the PM's visit to Bangladesh, not only did she command over the historic exchange of instruments of ratification of the Land Boundary Agreement, she also flagged off two new bus routes connecting both the countries, with the two prime ministers.
Although she failed to perform as far as the Teesta Agreement goes, it would not have been possible until she prepared a plan for north Bengal, which, needs to wait until the 2016 elections.
Mamata was a guest of Hasina's at the February 21 Language Day celebrations where she had publicly stated that she would push both pacts.
