Indian High Commissioner in BD believes; emergency is No Barrier!

by Nilotpal Roy
October 23, 2008

http://www.weeklyblitz.net/118/indian-high-commissioner-in-bd-believes-emergency

P. R. Chakraborty, the high commissioner of India in Dhaka said the state of emergency is no barrier to satisfactory elections. He pointed at the municipal and city corporation elections that were held in fair way under the emergency. Mr. Chakraborty said emergency created no hindrance in holding those elections. But, for the next parliamentary election he suggests further relaxation of emergency rules.

As to allegation from certain quarters with regard to interfering into the national affairs of Bangladesh by some foreign diplomats, Chakraborty dismissed such claims.

His government is prepared to hand over top-listed Bangladeshi criminal Subrata Bain, now in Kolkata under the captivity of Indian government, to Bangladesh authorities in exchange. India is eager to barter Bain by handing over of 10 identified Indian separatists, including Paresh Barua and Jibon Singh to them.

Mr. Chakraborty reminded that they have shown their sincerity by sending back seven Bangladeshi criminals to Bangladesh authorities, but the Bangladesh authorities have not yet handed over 10 Indian separatists to the Indian authorities.

He also said that the Indian government this time wanted to sign a bilateral agreement with the Bangladesh government regarding the handover of Subrata Bain.

The two neighboring countries do not have any extradition treaty so such exchanges would take place informally; through 'push-back' deportation. The Indian diplomat also said, Bangladesh's all commodities, except those on the negative list, had access to the Indian market, which resulted in growth of Bangladesh's exports.

The volume of Bangladesh's annual export now stands at $370 million, which used to be $ 60 million. Another mentionable point is that, previously negative list included 700 commodities while it is now 400.

As to Bangladesh's providing TRANSIT facilities to India the Indian diplomat said, both Bangladesh and India would be benefited economically if transit facilities were given to India. No progress has been made till now in this regard.

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