India and Bangladesh are close neighbors with common historical and cultural links and wide-ranging relations. There are extensive people-to-people contacts. With the formation of the Awami League-led Government in June 1996, a fresh impetus has been given to Indo-Bangladesh relations. The signing of the India-Bangladesh Treaty on Sharing of Ganga Waters on 12 December 1996 set the stage for the improvement of ties in all areas of bilateral relations.

Historical Background

• India’s links with Bangladesh are civilizational, cultural, social, and economic. There is much that unites the two countries - a shared history and common heritage, linguistic and cultural ties, and passion for music, literature, and the arts. The two nations were strong allies during the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971.
• However, they developed different Cold War alliances in the late 1970s and 80s. With the onset of economic liberalization in South Asia, they forged greater bilateral engagement and trade. The historic Ganges Water Sharing Treaty was concluded in 1996. India and Bangladesh are close strategic partners in counter-terrorism. They are also the largest trading partners in South Asia. Two-way trade in 2021-22 rose to $18.13 billion, 44% up from that in 2020-21 ($10.78 billion).

A chronology of key events

1947

• British colonial rule over India ends.
• A largely Muslim state comprising East and West Pakistan is established, on either side of India. The two provinces are separated from each other by more than 1,500 km of Indian territory.

1949

• The Awami League is established to campaign for East Pakistan’s autonomy from West Pakistan.

1970

• The Awami League, under Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, wins an overwhelming election victory in East Pakistan.
• The government in West Pakistan refuses to recognize the results, leading to rioting.

1971

• Sheikh Mujib was arrested and taken to West Pakistan. In exile, Awami League leaders proclaim the independence of the province of East Pakistan on 26th March. The new country is called Bangladesh. Just under 10 million Bangladeshis flee to India as troops from West Pakistan are defeated with Indian assistance.

1972

• Sheikh Mujib returns and becomes prime minister.
• He begins a program of nationalizing key industries in an attempt to improve living standards, but with little success.

1974

• Severe floods devastate much of the grain crop, leading to an estimated 28,000 deaths.
• A national state of emergency is declared as political unrest grows.

Major irritants in Indo-Bangladesh relations

Water Sharing

• India and Bangladesh share 54 transboundary rivers - big and small.

Ganga river dispute

• In 1996, the sharing of the Ganga waters was successfully agreed upon between the two nations. However, the major area of dispute has been India’s construction and operation of the Farakka Barrage to increase the water supply to the river Hooghly.
• Bangladesh complains that it does not get a fair share of the water in the dry season and some of its areas get flooded when India releases excess water during the monsoons.

Teesta River dispute

• Teesta originates in Sikkim and flows through West Bengal in India before entering Bangladesh.
• It merges with the Brahmaputra River (or Jamuna when it enters Bangladesh). The river is important for both Bangladesh and India for its agricultural use.

Teesta river agreement timeline

• In 1983, India and Bangladesh had agreed to an ad-hoc sharing of the water during the dry season (October to April) with an allocation of 36 percent for Bangladesh and 39 percent for India, leaving 25 percent to be decided later. But this deal has remained pending for more than 2 decades.
• As per an agreement of 2011 the two sides had agreed to share the river’s water 50:50, the same as the 1996 Ganges water-sharing pact between the neighbors. This agreement was not signed due to opposition from the Chief Minister of West Bengal.

Tipaimukh Hydro-Electric Power Project

• Bangladesh has been demanding to stop the construction of the Tipaimukh Hydro-Electric Power Project on the Barak River on the eastern edge of Bangladesh.
• Bangladesh says that the massive dam will disrupt the seasonal rhythm of the river and have an Adverse effect on downstream agriculture, fisheries, and ecology of the region. The Indian government has assured Bangladesh that it will not take any unilateral decision on the Tipaimukh Hydro-Electric Power Project which may adversely affect Bangladesh.

Tin Bigha

• The Tin Bigha Corridor is no larger than a football field.
• The Nehru-Noon accord of September 3, 1958, provided for a straightforward exchange of enclaves between India and East Pakistan.
• A formal agreement was signed thereafter on September 10, 1958.
• Besides the exchange, Berubari was to be split horizontally and equally.
• But the notification in respect of Berubari was never issued by India. Under the 1974 accord between Indira Gandhi and Mujibur Rehman, India agreed only to lease in perpetuity to Bangladesh an area of approximately 178 meters by 85 meters near Tin Bigha to connect Bangladesh with its enclave Dahagram.
• Agreement on the terms of the lease was reached in 1982. Only in 1992 could it be implemented.

New Moore Island

• The same holds good for the two newly formed tiny deltaic islands which India calls New Moore and Bangladesh calls South Talpatty.
• They were discovered by a U.S. satellite in 1974 and became an issue in the maritime boundary talks in 1979.
• Bangladesh claims that in May 1979 Prime Minister Morarji Desai agreed with the Deputy Prime Minister of Bangladesh, who had called on him, to hold a joint survey.
• However, on April 9, 1980, Indira Gandhi claimed that the islets belonged to India.
• They lie at the mouth of the Hariabhanga River which separates the two countries.
• They are mudflats with no human or animal life. In 1974, India and Bangladesh signed an agreement on the demarcation of the land boundary between the two countries.
• A maritime boundary agreement is yet to be concluded. It will define Bangladesh's Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), sandwiched as the country is between India and Myanmar.
• There is, surely, room enough for an imaginative initiative by India on the New Moore issue.  In November-December 1979, both states clashed over which of the two should administer approximately twenty hectares of emergent Charland in the Muhuri River.”
• These Disputes over the sharing of water and over ownership of small parcels of territory, such as the Tin Bigha Corridor, Muhuri Char, and New Moore Island, were symptomatic of the essentially poor relationship between India and Bangladesh.

Illegal Migration

• Long and porous border shared by India and Bangladesh cause a major demographic headache for India.
• It leads to illegal influx from Bangladesh to India, especially to Assam. This leads to unprecedented stress on India’s policy and resources.
• This is a complex question that requires due consideration from both sides. Illegal migration has brought insurgency and instability in North East.
• With many coastal areas of Bangladesh expected to submerge in the seas due to global warming, the issue might lead to disastrous consequences with India facing unprecedented number of climate refugees.
• Keeping all these factors in mind, the resolution of this issue is imperative for Indian policymakers.
• The Bangladesh Government and Chakma tribal insurgents signed a peace accord in December 1997, which allowed for the return of tribal refugees who had fled to India, beginning in 1986, to escape violence caused by an insurgency in their homeland in the Chittagong Hill Tracts.
• Indo-Bangladesh extradition treaty was signed in January 2013, with which both nations will be able to exchange convicts and undertrials as required. This treaty will give the way for the deportation of ULFA general secretary Anup Chetia, currently lodged in a Bangladeshi jail.

Transport Issues between India and Bangladesh

• Location of Bangladesh is critical for linking transit facilities to link up the Eastern states of Tripura, Mizoram, and Meghalaya. It is also important for India’s access to S.E. Asian countries.
• Bangladesh is not averse to allowing its territory the access to North-East region or transit facilities, but in return, it wants a continental transit facility through Bangladesh-India-Nepal-Bhutan.
• Differences exist in the case of the selection of the route of the Asian Highway Network (AHN) which has been opposed by Bangladesh because it does not want the India-Bangladesh portion of this route to enter it through India and go back to India. Instead, it wants a route starting from Myanmar, linking it to Chittagong through the North-Eastern part of India.

Chinese Engagement with Bangladesh

• Bangladesh and China have decade-long diplomatic ties. 2015 marked the 40th year of their relationship.
• China is the largest trading partner of Bangladesh in current times with two-way trade accounting for about US$12 billion in 2014. China is contributing largely to ongoing infrastructural development in Bangladesh.
• The growing security and military relations between the two countries in recent days are taking place much to the chagrin of New Delhi. Beijing’s current initiative for setting up financial institutions including the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) is likely to create new opportunities for Bangladesh in accessing funds for infrastructure development.
• Bangladesh’s renewed interest in the ocean economy in the Bay of Bengal in the context of the UN-approved delineation of the maritime boundary over the Bay, it needs to engage with technologically and financially sound partners like China, Japan, the United States, and South Korea, among others.
• Engagement with China may prove to be the most important economic relation for Bangladesh considering China’s growing and developing economy and international clout. However, Dhaka needs to balance its relations between New Delhi and Beijing for its own interest.
• In fine, India in its current focus on neighborhood prosperity is going to foster an enduring bilateral relationship with Bangladesh, as perceived from the ongoing engagements between New Delhi and Dhaka. Both countries are on the right track for building rapport in spheres of bilateral importance; however, deep-seated disputes like that of water-sharing need to be addressed for good for a better tomorrow.

Areas of Cooperation

• India’s relations with Bangladesh have certainly witnessed a significant upswing over the past decade, some persistent challenges notwithstanding. Bilateral trade has risen to $18.13 billion in 2021-22.
• Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has been cracking down on hardline elements and has provided India with logistical assistance, for instance in setting up the Paltana plant in Tripura. Sheikh Hasina, after being elected in December 2009 as Prime Minister, used her huge majority in Parliament to launch two initiatives.

1. One was eradication of terrorism from the country
2. The other was the trial of the 1971 war criminals for crime against humanity.

• One Jamaat senior leader has been executed, their mentor Golam Azam has been sentenced to life and cases against others are proceeding. This trial, which was long demanded by the freedom fighters, has set back both the Jamaat and BNP.
• On the terrorism front Sheikh Hasina has scored an unprecedented success. Indian insurgents like the ULFA, NSCN (I-M), and others have been rooted out of this country, and Islamic terrorists and extremists have been hit hard. Apart from Bangladesh India has been the greatest beneficiary of the Sheikh Hasina government’s action against terrorism.
• From October 2013, India started exporting 500 megawatts of electricity a day to Bangladesh over a period of 35 years
• In 2015, the Indian Parliament, unanimously passed the Land Boundary Agreement (LBA) as its 100th Constitutional amendment, thereby resolving all 68-year old border disputes since the end of the British Raj. The bill was pending ratification since the 1974 Mujib-Indira accords.
• Resolution of maritime dispute through UNCLOS PCA in favour of Bangladesh and India not re-appealing it.
• Easing of Visa regime to provide 5 year multiple entry visas to minors below 13 and elderly above 65.
• Bangladesh allowed India to ferry food and grains to the landlocked North east using its territory and infrastructure.
• India extended a $2 billion Line of Credit (LoC) to Bangladesh & pledged $5 billion worth of investments. As per the agreements, India’s Reliance Power agreed to invest US$3 billion to set up a 3,000 MW LNG-based power plant (which is the single largest foreign investment ever made in Bangladesh) & Adani Power will be setting up a 1600 MW coal-fired power plant at a cost of US$1.5 billion.
• Power agreement and internet service: Prime Ministers of India and Bangladesh commissioned international gateway of internet service in Agartala and supply of 100 MW power to Bangladesh from Tripura.

Bilateral trade

• In 2012-13 Bangladesh has replaced Sri Lanka as India’s largest sub-continental trading partner with agricultural exports and textile imports dominating.
• The two-way trade in FY 2021-22 reached $18.13 billion. The balance of trade is in favour of India.
• India- Bangladesh Grid interconnection, a 71-km Baharampur-Bheramara transmission link between the electricity grids of the two countries will boost the ties between the two nations.  The link would facilitate cross-border electricity transfer of up to 500 mega watt (MW) from India to Bangladesh.

• In 2021-22, Bangladesh has emerged as the largest trade partner for India in South Asia, and the fourth largest destination for Indian exports worldwide.
• India's exports to Bangladesh grew more than 66% from $9.69 billion in 2020-21 to $16.15 billion in 2021-22.
• India is the second-largest trading partner of Bangladesh and its largest export market in Asia. Despite COVID-19-related disruptions, bilateral trade grew at an unprecedented rate.
• India's main exports to Bangladesh are raw cotton, non-retail pure cotton yarn, and electricity.

India's economic assistance to Bangladesh

• On the economic assistance side, India has extended a line of credit of US$ 1 billion to Bangladesh for a range of projects, including railway infrastructure, supply of BG locomotives and passenger coaches, procurement of buses, and dredging projects.
• The Line of Credit Agreement was signed in Dhaka on August 7, 2010 between EXIM Bank of India and the Government of Bangladesh.
• In May 2012, India announced the conversion of $200  million as grant from the $1 billion LOC for projects prioritized by Bangladesh.
• India has stood by Bangladesh in its hour of need with aid worth over US $ 37 million) to help it cope with natural disasters and floods and supply of essential medicines, food and handed over 2,649 core shelters in the affected villages in Bagerhat district in southern Bangladesh.

BIMSTEC

• India and Bangladesh are both founder members of BIMSTEC, the new grouping established in 1997 for cooperation around the Bay of Bengal.
• The main sectors of operation under this cooperation are trade, investment, industrial cooperation, human resources development, tourism, energy, transportation, infrastructure, technology, fisheries, agriculture and natural resources. The other members are Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

Recent Developments

Maritime Dispute

• Verdict on the dispute regarding the delimitation of the maritime boundary between India and Bangladesh was settled by with a United Nations tribunal awarding Bangladesh 19,467 sq. km of the 25,602 sq. km sea area of the Bay of Bengal in December 2013
• Bangladesh went in for arbitration over the delimitation of maritime boundary under the United Nations Convention on Law of Sea (UNCLOS) on October 8 2009.The court concluded its hearings on December 18, 2013 in The Hague.The tribunal verdict is binding on all parties and there is no option for appeal

Land Boundary Agreement

Brief history

• After the partition of India in 1947, Rangpur was joined to East Pakistan, and Cooch Behar district was merged in 1949 with India. The desire to “de-enclave” most of the enclaves was manifested in a 1958 agreement between Jawaharlal Nehru and Feroz Khan Noon, the respective Prime Ministers, for an exchange between India and Pakistan without considering loss or gain of territory.
• But the matter then worked into a Supreme Court case in India, and the Supreme Court ruled that a constitutional amendment was required to transfer the land. So the ninth amendment was introduced to facilitate the implementation of the agreement.
• The amendment could not be passed because of an objection to transfer of southern Berubari enclave. Because of India’s deteriorated relations with Pakistan, the issue remained unsolved. With that agreement not ratified, negotiations restarted after East Pakistan became independent as Bangladesh in 1971 following the Bangladesh Liberation War
• Attempts have been made to arrive at a comprehensive settlement of the land boundary between India and Bangladesh (the erstwhile East Pakistan) since 1947. The Nehru-Noon Agreement of 1958 and the Agreement Concerning the Demarcation of the Land Boundary between India and Bangladesh and Related Matters of 1974 (referred to as 1974 LBA) sought to find a solution to the complex nature of the border demarcation involved.
• However, three outstanding issues pertaining to an un-demarcated land boundary of approximately 6.1 km, exchange of enclaves and adverse possessions remained unsettled.
• The list of enclaves was prepared in 1997 by both nations. Two Joint Boundary Working Groups was formed to work out the details of enclaves in 2001. The joint census was carried out it May 2007.
• The Protocol (referred to as the 2011 Protocol) to the 1974 LBA, signed on 6th September 2011 during the visit of the Prime Minister to Bangladesh, paves the way for a settlement of the outstanding land boundary issues between the two countries. The both nations announced an intention to swap 162 enclaves, giving residents a choice of nationality.
• Indian Parliament in May 2015 passed the constitutional amendment bill regarding the land boundary agreement with Bangladesh. The Lower House, showing rare unanimity, passed the Constitution (119th Amendment) Bill to allow the operationalisation of the 1974 India-Bangladesh Land Boundary agreement.

Major features of the agreement

• A settled boundary is an essential prerequisite for effective cross-border cooperation. It reduces friction, helps neighbours consolidate mutually beneficial exchanges and promotes confidence in building better relations.
• The 2011 Protocol ensures that the India-Bangladesh boundary is permanently settled with no more differences in interpretation, regardless of the government in power.
• The 2011 Protocol results in a fixed demarcated boundary in all the un-demarcated segments, exchange of 111 Indian enclaves in Bangladesh with 51 Bangladesh enclaves in India and a resolution of all adversely possessed areas.
• In the exchange of enclaves, India transfers 111 enclaves with a total area of 17,160.63 acres to Bangladesh, while Bangladesh would transfer 51 enclaves with an area of 7,110.02 acres to India.
• While on paper, the exchange of enclaves between India and Bangladesh may seem like a loss of Indian land to Bangladesh, the actual scenario is quite different as the enclaves are located deep inside the territory of both countries and there has been no physical access to them from either country.
• Each country will now begin to administer enclaves on its territory and enclave citizens will be able to choose where they want to live and which nationality they would prefer.
• In reality, the exchange of enclaves denotes only a notional exchange of land as the Protocol converts a de facto reality into a de jure situation.
• The inhabitants in the enclaves could not enjoy full legal rights as citizens of either India or Bangladesh and infrastructure facilities such as electricity, schools and health services were deficient.
  Further, due to lack of access to these areas by the law and order enforcing agencies and weak property rights, certain enclaves became hot beds of criminal activities.

Major advantages of land boundary agreement

• The exchange of enclaves will mitigate major humanitarian problems as the residents in the enclaves and others on their behalf had often complained of the absence of basic amenities and facilities the settlement of Adverse Possessions will lead to tranquility and peace along the border it represents a permanent solution to a decades old issue the newly demarcated boundaries are a fixed boundary, thereby adding to certainty regarding the future a settled boundary reduces friction, helps neighbors consolidate mutually beneficial exchanges and promotes confidence in building better relations.
• It paves the way for closer engagement and mutually beneficial relations between India and Bangladesh and the region; this also helps on issues of strategic concern, including security cooperation and denial of sanctuary to elements inimical to India. While land will be exchanged, the Protocol does not envisage the displacement of populations; the Protocol ensures that the India-Bangladesh boundary is permanently settled and there should be no more differences in interpretation, regardless of the government in power.
• This deal would also revive the moribund South Asia Growth Quadrangle (SAGQ), comprising India’s north east, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan.

Indo-Bangladesh Maritime Boundary Dispute 

• In a landmark judgment, the Hague-based Permanent Court of Attribution (PCA) has awarded Bangladesh an area of 19,467 sq km, four-fifth of the total area of 25,602 sq km disputed maritime boundary in the Bay of Bengal with India on July 7.
• The UN Tribunal’s award has clearly delineated the course of maritime boundary line between India and Bangladesh in the territorial sea, Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) and continental shelf within and beyond 200 nautical miles (nm). Now, Bangladesh’s maritime boundary has been extended by 118,813 sq comprising 12 nautical miles of territorial sea and an EEZ extending up to 200 nm into the high seas.
• In addition, the ruling acknowledged Bangladesh’s sovereign rights of undersea resources in the continental shelf extending as far as 345 nm in the high seas, taking Chittagong coast as the base line. The verdict has been broadly accepted by both the countries as a positive development for further consolidation of friendly relations especially given the geo-strategic/political significance of greater Indian Ocean region and South Asian sub-region.

Security and Economic implications for India

• Some are of the scholars’ opinion that the ruling could provide force for the new Indian government to ratify the Land Boundary Agreement and reach an understanding on sharing the waters of the Teesta river with Bangladesh.
• The verdict would contribute towards establishing strategic partnerships among the nations sharing borders in the Bay.
• The award is expected to have positive impact on emerging multilateral forum like BIMSTEC. It may be noted that India has already settled its maritime borders with Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Thailand. Similarly, Bangladesh’s maritime issues with Myanmar are resolved.
• The PCA award assumes strategic significance against the backdrop of China’s close ties with Bangladesh and its growing interests and activities in the Bay region for which India is worried. Now the settlement of maritime disputes between India and Bangladesh may have a restraining influence on the expansionist designs of China.
• Both the countries have accepted the award as it will open the door for exploration of oil and gas in the Bay—the site of huge energy reserves.
• The verdict has recognised India’s sovereignty over New Moore island and received nearly 6000 sq km of the contested zone where the island had once existed.
• India’s discovery of natural gas in 2006 took place in a creek which is situated about 50 km south of the mouth of the Hariabhanga river within the contested zone. The lingering maritime dispute stood in the way of exploration of hydrocarbons in the Bay region. Such as in December, 2013, Australian firm Santos withdrew from two sea-blocks citing security and maritime dispute with Bangladesh.
• Now India’s policy makers could chalk out a long-term strategy for the economic delopment of the Bay region. To realise its goals, New Delhi may forge bilateral or multilateral partnerships under the framework of sub-regional grouping like BIMSTEC

Conclusion

• India’s relations with Bangladesh are rooted in history, culture and the struggle for freedom. There is a desire in India to have across the board engagement with Bangladesh, so that the fruits of our cooperation are available to people on both sides of the border. The Prime Minister’s visit to Dhaka will provide an opportunity to review the progress achieved in the implementation of the decisions taken during the historic visit of Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to India in 2010.
• As a close neighbour, India's partnership with Bangladesh is important for the stability and prosperity of its own northeast region, it is a partnership which can have a profound positive impact on the South Asian region as a whole.
• The important ongoing and potential infrastructure projects in this regard are Moreh -Tamu–Kalewa Road, India-Myanmar-Thailand Trilateral Highway, Trans Asian Highway, the India-Myanmar rail linkages, Kaladan Multimodal project, the Stilwell road, Myanmar-India-Bangladesh gas and/or oil pipeline, Tamanthi Hydroelectricity project and optical fiber network between Northeast India and Southeast Asia.
• Regional organizations like SAARC and BIMSTEC can be leveraged to sort out the issues which cannot be dealt with bilaterally. For example, SAFTA has proved to be a great idea in tackling the trade related grievances of Bangladesh. It can be used as a platform for developing better understanding between the two countries. India s “Look East Policy” cannot be completely successful without cooperation from Bangladesh.

Recent developments

• India has provided duty-free quota-free access to Bangladesh on all tariff lines except tobacco and alcohol under the South Asia Free Trade Area (SAFTA) since 2011.
• Six border haats (4 in Meghalaya and 2 in Tripura) have been approved by the Indian and Bangladeshi governments.
• India-Bangladesh Pipeline Project signed in 2018 that will connect Siliguri in West Bengal to Parbatipur in Bangladesh.
• India and Bangladesh have also signed the Framework of Understanding on Cooperation in the Hydrocarbon sector. This is one of the seven agreements entered into in 2020.