India-Nepal-Bangladesh buses flagged off

India, Bangladesh and Nepal launched the tri-nation trial bus service here on Monday to kickstart Prime Minister Narendra Modi's initiative to connect the region. Two Kathmandu-bound buses were flagged off in Dhaka. They will pass through Indian territory – Siliguri corridor. In June 2015, the three countries had signed the Motor Vehicle Agreement as part of the Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Nepal (BBIN) initiative of launching a South Asia Sub-regional Economic Cooperation.

The journey will not cover Bhutan as the country requires backed off to ratify the motor vehicle agreement in its parliament. It, however, has asked the three countries to go ahead with the bus service. The buses would travel 1,200 kilometres over the next three days and arrive at Kathmandu on April 26, said Farid Ahmed Bhuiyan, chairman of Bangladesh Road Transport Corporation. "Our journey today would survey how we can make things easy for passengers in the future. All the three countries will work together so that this route can be made feasible," Bhuiyan told WION.

Some passengers feared that the long journey could become a disincentive for travellers. Officials said if the visa procedures and travel requirements can be made easier, more passengers would feel encouraged to use the bus service. A passenger protocol will be signed later in Delhi by the transport secretaries of the respective countries but a date has not been fixed yet. There will also be discussion about protocols for cargo vehicles. "Protocols normally provide the visa procedures, technical specifications of the buses, how the buses will run after getting route permits, driver license and travel documents and passenger documents that would be required," said Govinda Prasad Kharel, under secretary of the Nepal's Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport.

The initiative would be a breakthrough for seamless cross-border movement of vehicles among the countries, which in the future can increase trade and tourism within the region.

According to the World Bank, intra-regional trade accounts for only five percent of South Asia's total trade, compared to 25 percent in ASEAN. The report says South Asia is one of the least integrated regions.

Failure to pull off South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation has prompted South Asian countries to mull subregional economic cooperation. But tension within the region such as the Rohingya crisis and the Doklam standoff between China and India are major stumbling blocks to corridors of economic opportunities such as the Bangladesh, China, India and Myanmar.