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Showing posts with label dhaka. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dhaka. Show all posts

Monday, 14 August 2017

07:15

MAITREE EXPRESS CANCELLED FROM 1.9.17 TO 4.9.17

MAITREE EXPRESS CANCELLED FROM 1.9.17 TO 4.9.17

KOLKATA – DHAKA CANTT. MAITREE EXPRESS TO REMAIN CANCELLED FOR ‘EID-UL-AZHA’ CELEBRATION IN BANGLADESH
Kolkata, August 8, 2017

13107/13108 & 13109/13110 Kolkata – Dhaka Cantt. – Kolkata Maitree Express will remain cancelled between 1.9.2017 & 4.9.2017 due to ‘Eid-Ul-Azha’ celebration in Bangladesh.

13107/13108 Maitree Express will remain cancelled o­n 1 & 3.9.2017 from Dhaka Cantt. and o­n 2 & 4.9.2017 from Kolkata station. 13109/13110 Maitree Express will remain cancelled o­n 1.9.2017 from Kolkata station and o­n 2.9.2017 from Dhaka Cantt.


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Monday, 10 April 2017

07:44

India -Bangladesh -India a new Express Passenger Train -Maitree Express

India -Bangladesh -India a new Express Passenger Train -Maitree Express
PETRAPOLE, Sealdah Division: Nine years after the inauguration of the Maitree (friendship) Express passenger train service between Kolkata and Dhaka, the first Khulna-Kolkata train chugged in to the Petrapole Railway station On the India-Bangladesh border on Saturday.
This will be the second passenger service between the two countries. The first such service ‘Maitree Express’ was flagged off between Kolkata and Dhaka Cantonment stations in April 2008. After the passage of nine years, there is growing demand for more railway connections between Indian and Bangladesh.

Repeatedly sounding its hooter, the five-coach diesel-hauled Maitree Express-II stopped at the railway station on the Indian side of the border at about 1.40 pm to loud cheers and applause. On a trial run, it carried a 43-member Bangladesh delegation, who were warmly greeted and received with bouquets and garlands by Indian Railway officials.

Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his visiting Bangladesh counterpart, Sheikh Hasina, inaugurated the trial run through a video link from New Delhi.

Resplendent in green and saffron border on white base, the Maitree Express II set off from Khulna at 8.15 a.m. and entered India through Benapole from the Bangladesh side.

The 176-km journey includes 96 km on the Bangladesh side. Railway officials said the regular passenger train services are expected to begin from July.

“The services are expected to kick off from July this year from Kolkata to Khulna through Petrapole- Benapole (on the Bangladesh side). The fare and the frequency of the services are yet to be decided,” said Basudev Panda, Divisional Railway Manager, Sealdah, Eastern Railway.

On Saturday S N Agrawal, General Manager, Eastern & South Eastern Railways, Satish Kumar, Addl. General Manager, Eastern Railway, Basudev Panda, Divisional Railway Manager, Sealdah, Eastern Railway will be present at Petrapole (on the Indian side) to receive senior railway officials from Bangladesh.

Interestingly, much before an international border came up and political realignments changed the landscape of the two Bengals, regular passenger services connected Sealdah to Khulna and Jessore through the Petrapole-Benapole route.

Bangladesh Railway’s Chief Mechanical Engineer (West) Md. Iftikar Hossain said: “The train will have the air-conditioned and non air-conditioned compartments along with medical facilities. The fare will be at par with the fares of Maitree I. The number of air-conditioned and non ac and non air-conditioned compartments will depend on the number of passengers.”

“The Maitree I which runs twice a week has about 450 seats. We see on an average 80 per cent of seats are always booked,” Panda said.

Panda said the two countries would initiateAthe process of establishing immigration and customs facilities at the terminal destinations so that no change-over is required in between.

“The new passenger service will give a momemtum to collaboration between the two countries. People from the southern part of Bangladesh will benefit from the new service,” said Syed Salma Jafreen, Deputy Secretary, Bangladesh Ministry of Home Affairs.

Regular passenger services connected Sealdah to Khulna and Jessore through the route, much before the partition of India in 1947.

Passenger train services between the two countries were suspended after the 1965 war between India and Pakistan, when the territory now known as Bangladesh comprised the Pakistan’s eastern province.

East Pakistan later became independent Bangladesh in 1971.

Nearly 30 years after Bangladesh’s independence, the Indo-Bangla Petrapole-Benapole rail corridor was re-opened in January 2001 for goods traffic.

According to officials, these trains are now running on a regular basis.

On April 14, 2008, the passenger train service between Dhaka and Kolkata — the Maitree Express — was launched.

 Source:RailNews
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Tuesday, 28 July 2015

08:14

Bangladesh and India Agreements for Railway Traffic between the Routes

Progress in Rail Sector Between India and Bangladesh
The Fundamental and Subsidiary Rules for Interchange of Railway Traffic between India and Bangladesh was signed in Dhaka on 11.08.1972. These Rules, mutatis mutandis, are still continuing.

Indian Railways have Agreements with Bangladesh Railway for interchange of goods traffic between India and Bangladesh via the following routes:

Route
Operational
Gede(India)--Darsana (Bangladesh)
Since 1972
Singhabad(India)–Rohanpur (Bangladesh)
Since 1992
Petrapole(India)–Benapole (Bangladesh)
Since 2001
Radhikapur(India)-- Birol (Bangladesh)
Not operational since 01.04.2005. Gauge conversion on Bangladesh side is yet to be completed.
Mahisasan(India)–Shahbazpur (Bangladesh)
Not operational since December 1996 due to breaches and lack of traffic.
An Agreement was signed between the Government of India and the Government of Bangladesh in Dhaka on 10.04.2008 for running passenger train services between India and Bangladesh. Maitree Express is running between Kolkata and Dhaka Cantonment via Gede – Darsana route.
A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was also signed between the Government of India and the Government of Bangladesh in Dhaka on 16.02.2013 for development of Railway infrastructure to establish rail link between Agartala (India) and Akhaura (Bangladesh). This project is presently at standstill because of sharp increase in cost of land for the sections in India.
This information was given by the Minister of State for Railways Shri Manoj Sinha in a written reply to a question in Lok Sabha.

Source:PIBNEWS.


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Thursday, 25 June 2015

07:34

Bangladesh to construct Double Track Standard-Gauge Railway Line between Dhaka-Chittagong with Chinese funding

Bangladesh to construct Double Track Standard-Gauge Railway Line between Dhaka-Chittagong with Chinese funding

Dhaka: Railways Minister Mazibul Hoque yesterday told parliament that the government had taken initiative to implement a project to reduce the length of Dhaka-Chittagong rail track by 90km and shorten the journey between the two cities.

“An initiative has been taken to implement the project, titled “Construction of Double Track Standard-Gauge Railway Line” between Dhaka and Chittagong via Laksham, Comilla, with Chinese funding on government-to-government basis, instead of setting up the Dhaka-Comilla elevated railway,” the minister said in reply to a question.

If the project is implemented, the rail distance between Dhaka and Chittagong will decrease by around 90km and it will take only three hours to travel from one city to another via train.

He said a Memorandum of Understanding has already been signed with a Chinese firm in this regard and a Preliminary Development Project Proforma was approved in principle for the project by the Planning Minister.

If the project is finally approved after getting the Chinese fund, it will take some three years to complete physical works of the project, Mazibul said.
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Tuesday, 2 June 2015

07:05

Focus on Rail links ahead of PM’s visit to Bangladesh

Focus on Rail links ahead of PM’s visit to Bangladesh

New Delhi: Narendra Modi during his visit to Dhaka is likely to discuss new bus and train routes as already the Bengal government has cleared two new routes from Kolkata and are awaiting the sanction of Centre – Kolkata to Chittagong and Kolkata to Shillong via Bangladesh. Modi will be flagging off the Kolkata-Agartala bus route at Dhaka on June 7, which will be rolling out of Kolkata on June 5. Even Modi government is considering a new rail route Khulna to Kolkata and for that already a meeting was held in March. For that the Prime Ministers of the two countries might be discussing about using the rail tracks in Bangladesh.A senior official said that the Khulna-Kolkata rail link can be easily launched soon, but the home ministry is concerned with the security aspect and for that the Centre is delaying in giving clearance to this route, which is of high demand. The Centre is also considering if a rail link to Agartala can be done via Dhaka, as already the Maitree express runs on six days between Kolkata and Dhaka and extending it to Agartala is on the cards. Bangladesh officials are planning to connect the line from Dhaka to Akhaura through broad gauge and then on the Indian side from Akhaura to Agartala can be easily connected. At present the line between Dhaka to Akhaura is on metre gauge, so a change of tracks is needed in this section.

The new bus route from Kolkata to Agartala will take around 18 hours including the customs and immigration checks. The officials are also likely to discuss how the checking time can be reduced, as it causes major inconvenience to the passengers.

An official said that the trains on a regular basis carry around 400 passengers. Both the governments are considering to increase people to people contact and for that the rail and road links are going to increase, particularly after the land boundary agreement going to be a reality. For that the transport officials of Bengal had proposed a bus link to Chittagong from Kolkata and another to Shillong via Dinajpur in Bangaldesh. Nilanjan Shandilya, MD of West Bengal Surface Transport Corporation (WBSTC) said that the two proposed routes had been sent to the Centre for clearance. But the bus to Chittagong can take over 18 hours, though it will help trade links, officials said.

Another rail link is also on the cards connecting Kolkata with North Bengal through Iswardi in Bangladesh via Nilphamari in northern Bangladesh to Siliguri or Cooch Behar. During the post-independence days, Kolkata-Siliguri trains used to run in this route too, this is likely to be revived soon.

Train routes

Kolkata to Khulna
Kolkata to Agartala via Dhaka
Kolkata to North Bengal via Nilphamari
Bus links :

Kolkata to Chittagong
Kolkata to Shillong via Bangladesh
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Wednesday, 27 May 2015

11:41

Bangladesh approves 9 projects, including rail track from Khulna to Mongla Port on Indian LoC

Bangladesh approves 9 projects, including rail track from Khulna to Mongla Port on Indian LoC

Dhaka: The Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) of Bangladesh on Tuesday approved a revised project worth Tk 3,801.61 crore to build a new railway track from Khulna to Mongla Port following a feasibility study.

The project will be partly financed out of the Indian line-of-credit, the $1 billion low-interest loan offered by the last Indian government to Dhaka to implement infrastructure projects that would ultimately aid connectivity between the two nations. The revised project will cost double the original.

The approval came from the 29th ECNEC meeting of the current fiscal held at the NEC conference room in the city’s Sher-e-Bangla Nagar area with NEC chairperson and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair.

The estimated cost of Khulna-Mongla rail project, to be financed by the Indian government, has more than doubled in last five years. The project cost was estimated to be Tk 17.21 billion when it was first approved in 2010.

But ECNEC on Tuesday revised the cost to Tk 38.02 billion, 121 percent more than its first estimate.

India will extend Tk 23.71 billion in loan and the government will fund the rest 14.31 billion for the project.

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina presided over the ECNEC (Executive Committee of the National Economic Council) meeting.

Bangladesh Railway will implement the project by June 2018.

After the meeting, Planning Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal gave reasons for the cost overrun.

 “A 717-metre rail bridge has to be constructed on the river Rupsha due to change in the alignment of the rail tracks. The length of the rail track has increased by 12 kilometres,” he said.

“Apart from that, some more land has to be acquired.”

The minister said around 65-kilometre broad-gauge rail tracks and 21-kilometre loop-line would be constructed.

Of the total outlay, Tk 22 billion will be spent on construction of the rail tracks and bridge, Tk 10 billion on acquisition of 678 acres of land and the rest will be incurred on other heads.

The ECNEC meeting also approved a project for construction of rail tracks from Kulaurha to Shahbazpur in Moulvibazar with financial support from India.

Kamal said the government had decided to resume rail links between Kulaurha and Shahbazpur, and for that, the Tk 6.78-billion project had been approved.

According to the project paper, the Indian government will provide Tk 5.56 billion in loan for the implementation of the project while Bangladesh will arrange the remaining Tk 1.22 billion.

New Delhi had signed a deal with Dhaka during Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s visit to India in 2010 to give Bangladesh $1 billion in loan at 1 percent interest rate.

The loan money is being spent on 15 projects, including two in the railway sector.

The Indian government has endorsed use of $200 million of the loan package in construction of the Padma Bridge.

India has also agreed to give Bangladesh another $62 million in loan as more money is needed for completion of the projects under implementation.
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Saturday, 23 May 2015

08:21

Prabhu for boosting ties with Dhaka

Suggests collaboration in climate change, transportation and agriculture

A partnership between New Delhi and Dhaka to save the rare ecosystem of the Sundarbans and that agreement should be signed in a boat — that was Union Minister Suresh Prabhu’s suggestion as Environment Minister in 1998 to his counterpart in Dhaka which could not be carried out.

Ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Dhaka, Mr. Prabhu, who now holds the portfolio of Railways, said his earlier suggestion could still be followed up with more such agreements between the two nations on various other fronts including climate change, transportation and agriculture.

Sundarbans ecosystem
“I proposed to my counterpart [then] that the Sundarbans is one common ecosystem, when the tigers go from India to Bangladesh and from there to here, they don’t need any passport or visa, no custom can stop them ... why not we, therefore, conserve the rarest ecosystem in the world. I proposed I will come from this side on a boat; you come from that side ... I think we should try to do that soon. We will have to do so many things together, this is one of them,” he said addressing the sixth India-Bangladesh friendship dialogue on “Bangladesh-India relations: bilateralism and beyond.”

Having ratified the four-decade-old India-Bangladesh Land Border Agreement, New Delhi is keen to extend its partnership with Bangladesh to areas such as climate change, energy and transportation, he said. Pitching for a joint water management between the two countries, Mr. Prabhu said: “It will be a great advantage to do joint water management, and save us from natural disasters; floods cause more damage than draught. If we put up a joint water management front with India, Bangladesh and even Nepal, without taking away anyone’s water, we can meet the challenge of climate change.”

Energy cooperation
He suggested collaboration even in the field of agriculture, and setting up of a grid for energy cooperation. “India and Bangladesh are trying to work together in the sector of railways, I have extended an invitation to my Bangladeshi counterpart,” he said.

Source :The Hindu
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