By Ashik kabir

India and Bangladesh share a close tie historically, geographically and also culturally. There is always a shuffling going on in the policies concerning India from the Bangladeshi side. After the independence of Bangladesh, there was an emergence of two groups in between the political elites of Bangladesh. The first group is the ‘ liberal-secular-linguistic’ one who are having a closer relationship with India and the second is the ‘ religious nationalistic tendency with Islam as its core’ who have distanced themselves from India. It’s obvious that the first party is the Bangladesh Awami League who are allied with the progressive left-wing political parties and the second is the Bangladesh nationalist party who are connected with other religious right wing political parties. While Awami league is India leaning, on the other side BNP has maintained an attitude of mistrust towards India and constantly adopted an anti-Indian foreign policy stance as a counter- balancing strategy. But in the recent past while Awami league is in power there is a tremendous enhancement both in the political and economical relationship between the two countries. Both the countries have agreed to a sub- regional cooperation in the fields of energy, trade, food security, commerce and also in transport along with connectivity. There are huge scope of investment in the areas of agriculture, fisheries, health, education, telecommunication, human resource development and climate change. There is always a question of huge trade gap between both the countries. While Indian formal exports to Bangladesh amounted to US$4 billion, on the other side Bangladesh’s total export to India was around US$350 million. There is tariff barrier in the trade between the countries. Until and unless it’s not remove the trade gap between both the countries will be augmenting. The Free trade agreement should be taken into the account in a priority basis. For increasing the bilateral ties opening up of border haats and introductions of land customs system are being adopted. Bangladesh had expressed its interest to open trade missions in Guwahati, Agartala, Siliguri and Aizwal at the joint secretary level trade talks between India and Bangladesh. Bangladesh and India have signed a power purchase agreement for the purchase of 250 MW electricity from India to Bangladesh. In January 2012 a joint venture was also signed between the two countries for setting up a 1320MW coal-fired power plant in Bangladesh. India also made an announcement welcoming Bangladesh in power projects in India in 2012, particularly hydro-power projects in the northeastern states of India. Both the countries has possibilities in cooperating each other in exploiting natural gas and oil for energy security. Other than these projects there are multiple possibilities between both countries where they can explore nuclear energy sector. India has wished for undertaking a nuclear project in Bangladesh. Russia and India can jointly undertake a nuclear project in Bangladesh where there is already a MOU prevailing. India also can supply nuclear power by dedicating from one of its eastern projects to Bangladesh. Both the countries can assist each other in capacity building. They can also collaborate in the energy sector, particularly in the solar energy. With both the country assisting each other will lead them to more friendly, peaceful, economically integrated South-Asia where extra regional will not be extracting out the advantages.
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