Passenger train services between India and Bangladesh were restored yesterday, more than 40 years after direct train links were suspended between the neighbors following the 1965 India-Pakistan war.
The “Moitree [Friendship] Express” train between India’s Calcutta and the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka was flagged off by Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee in a colorful ceremony coinciding with the Bengali New Year.
Bedecked with flowers, the six-coach train carrying 250 passengers began its 500km journey to Dhaka after Mukherjee gave a signal through remote control.
The minister described it as a “historic and memorable” day for both countries and thanked the railway authorities for resuming the service that he said would bring the neighbors closer.
But the train was briefly stopped in the Nadia district bordering Bangladesh when about 50 protesters demanding help for Bangladeshi refugees squatted on the train tracks.
Security forces on the train got down when it stopped, but did not have to use force against the squatters who lifted the blockade of their own, PTI news agency said.
Railway officials said the Moitree Express would be a twice-weekly service. It will leave Kolkata for Dhaka on Saturdays and Sundays. The Indian service will have a capacity for 368 passengers while the Bangladeshi will accommodate 418 passengers.
The service was suspended following the 1965 war between India and Pakistan, of which Bangladesh was the eastern part. Bangladesh gained independence in 1971 but it was not until 2001 that India and Bangladesh began steps to resume the train link.
Railway officials said that the common history, culture and language of Bengalis on both sides of the borders had generated a demand for regular train service.
Many Bengalis who live in India’s West Bengal state said they would visit their native villages in Bangladesh.
“It is my homeland. I was born in Bangladesh and studied in Dhaka university. I also served as a principal in a school before we moved to India,” a passenger told the Headlines Today news channel.
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