India has proposed to expand its Agartala airport into the Bangladesh territory in Brahmanbaria for an upgrade to international standards, Bangladesh officials said.
The home minister, Asaduzzaman Khan, told New Age on Monday that the government was yet to make any decision on the issue.
India, which already has obtained transit and transshipment facilities, has made the proposal at several meetings in the past one year.
The foreign ministry held a meeting in October with other relevant ministries and intelligence agencies to examine whether or how Bangladesh could share its land with India for the expansion of Agartala Airport in Tripura which was renamed as Maharaja Bir Bikram Airport on August 7, 2018.
None of the officials disclosed the amount of land that India has sought but a defence ministry official said that the existing Agartala airport and its runway were located less than a kilometre off the border at Chanpur of Akhaura.
A defence ministry official posted to Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka said that aircraft from Kolkata and Guwahati needed to use the Bangladesh airspace during take-off and landing at Agartala airport.
India first made the proposal at a bilateral meeting in July 2018 when India’s the then home minister Rajnath Singh, now the defence minister, visited Bangladesh.
‘As we were approached on the issue at the meeting, we asked them to make a formal proposal,’ the civil aviation and tourism secretary, Mohibul Haque, said.
Two senior officials who attended the meeting at the foreign ministry in October 2018 said that a military official detailed security issues of the sharing of the Bangladesh territory with India.
‘We also discussed how the airport would be managed and whether the bordering land would be leased out and what might be the process if the government wanted to share the land with India,’ one official said.
Another official who attended the meeting drew a map and showed if the Agartala airport was extended, India would install lights inside the Bangladesh territory and would fence it for airport security.
01/08/19 Muktadir Rashid/NewAge Bangladesh
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The home minister, Asaduzzaman Khan, told New Age on Monday that the government was yet to make any decision on the issue.
India, which already has obtained transit and transshipment facilities, has made the proposal at several meetings in the past one year.
The foreign ministry held a meeting in October with other relevant ministries and intelligence agencies to examine whether or how Bangladesh could share its land with India for the expansion of Agartala Airport in Tripura which was renamed as Maharaja Bir Bikram Airport on August 7, 2018.
None of the officials disclosed the amount of land that India has sought but a defence ministry official said that the existing Agartala airport and its runway were located less than a kilometre off the border at Chanpur of Akhaura.
A defence ministry official posted to Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in Dhaka said that aircraft from Kolkata and Guwahati needed to use the Bangladesh airspace during take-off and landing at Agartala airport.
India first made the proposal at a bilateral meeting in July 2018 when India’s the then home minister Rajnath Singh, now the defence minister, visited Bangladesh.
‘As we were approached on the issue at the meeting, we asked them to make a formal proposal,’ the civil aviation and tourism secretary, Mohibul Haque, said.
Two senior officials who attended the meeting at the foreign ministry in October 2018 said that a military official detailed security issues of the sharing of the Bangladesh territory with India.
‘We also discussed how the airport would be managed and whether the bordering land would be leased out and what might be the process if the government wanted to share the land with India,’ one official said.
Another official who attended the meeting drew a map and showed if the Agartala airport was extended, India would install lights inside the Bangladesh territory and would fence it for airport security.
01/08/19 Muktadir Rashid/NewAge Bangladesh
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