August 26, 2020: The inland waterway Sonamura-Daudkandi route, connecting Tripura with Bangladesh, will have its first trial run in the first week of September when barges carry 50 tonnes of cement, Tripura Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb said.
The 93 km long waterway route was included in the list of India-Bangla protocol (IBP) routes in May this year.
“….The trial run is scheduled in the first week of September 2020, during which 50 tonnes of cement will be transported in barges from Dhaka to Sonamura. This is for the first time in history that any kind of goods will be reaching Tripura by ship,” Deb said in a post on his Facebook page.
The Chief Minister said the Bangladesh Inland Water Transport Authority has given permission for the trial run from Daundkandi to Sonamura in Tripura’s Sepahijala district, 60 km away from Agartala via river Gomati, our New Delhi correspondent reports.
Tripura installed a floating jetty on Gomati on July 4 as part of the India-Bangla international inland waterways connectivity project.
Traders of India and Bangladesh had demanded a trial run of vessels on Gomati river this month to operationalise goods traffic on the Sonamura-Daudkandi route, officials said.
A high-level team of officials of the Bangladesh Shipping Ministry had surveyed the protocol route on August 12, Sonamura sub-divisional magistrate SubrataMajumder said.
“Of the 90 km stretch, around 89.5 km is in the neighbouring country. Export-import traders of the two countries proposed a trial run of barges through the protocol route,” he said.
Source: The Daily Star
