♤ Bangladesh-India coastal shipping began operationalisation in March 2016.

♤ In 2017 Bangladesh allowed Indian vessels to dock at Chittagong Port, the first time after 40 years. Indian companies are interested in developing Payra Port.

♤ Trucks carrying Indian goods reached Tripura from Ashuganj port in Bangladesh on June 19 2016, making the long-cherished idea of transshipment into reality

♤ Grid Connectivity: Bangladesh already draws 600 megawatt from the Indian grid, with another 500 megawatt to be added through the Bheramara-Bahrampur inter-connection.

♤ Diesel Pipeline: India is already constructing a Indo-Bangla friendship pipeline from Siliguri to Parbatipur (In Bangladesh) for supply of high speed diesel as a grant-in-aid.

♤ If the two neighbors have their way, by mid-2020 India will cease to depend only on the Siliguri Corridor or the Chickens Neck, the 22-km corridor near Siliguri in West Bengal that connects the Northeast with the rest of the country.

♤ Waterways: Once the dredging in Bangladesh is complete, large vessels can move from Varanasi in National Waterway 1 (NW-1, the Ganga) to NW-2 (Brahmaputra) and NW-16 (Barak) via Bangladesh river channels, thereby reducing the over-dependence on the narrow stretch.

♤ An ambitious gas pipeline project with Bangladesh and Myanmar has been revived in 2017 at the conceptual level. India can take this opportunity forward to consolidate regional connectivity.

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