Bangladesh aims to enhance regional connectivity
The government is taking steps to expand the highway connected to the BCIM corridor.
On Thursday, Bangladesh issued a tender to upgrade a two-lane road connecting its key eastern land border port with India's northeast into a four-lane dual carriageway. This 43-km stretch between Sylhet and Sheola Land Port, near Sutarkandi Land Port in Assam, India, will be transformed to enhance Indo-Bangla cross-border connectivity and unlock the untapped potential of bilateral and regional trade. Khan Md Kamrul Ahsan, Project Director of the Sylhet-Charkhai-Sheola Highway Improvement Project, informed Dhaka Tribune that the road will be developed into a four-lane highway with pavements and service roads. He added that the dual carriageway works are expected to be completed by mid-2028, assuming physical work begins by mid-2025 after the tender process concludes.
The total cost of the project is Tk4,257 crore, with the World Bank contributing Tk2,886.82 crore and the government financing Tk1,370.25 crore.
Expanding the highway will boost cross-border trade and commerce, offering new opportunities for exporting goods to India’s seven northeastern states. The Sylhet-Sheola road segment plays a crucial role in the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar (BCIM) corridor, which connects approximately 440 million people across China’s Yunnan province, Bangladesh, Myanmar, and Northeast India through road, rail, water, and air links.
This expansion is part of Bangladesh's broader efforts under the World Bank-funded Accelerating Transport and Trade Connectivity in Eastern South Asia Project (ACCESS) to enhance the efficiency and resilience of trade and transport along regional corridors in eastern South Asia. The project coincides with efforts to convert the Dhaka-Sylhet-Tamabil highway into a four-lane road, which connects Bangladesh’s Sylhet region with India's Meghalaya via the Tamabil border.
Significance of Sheola-Sutarkandi Land Border
The Sheola-Sutarkandi trade route is one of the 16 operational land ports in Bangladesh, out of a total of 24. In the 2023-24 period, Sheola Land Port facilitated the import of over 9.56 lakh tons of goods and the export of over 7,200 tons. While the precise trade value is unavailable from the Bangladesh Land Port Authority (BLPA), the Indian Land Ports Authority (LPAI) reported that Sutarkandi Land Port facilitated trade worth Tk353 crore in 2023-24, more than doubling the trade value of Tk162 crore from 2017-18.
Sheola Land Port, located in the Konagram border area of Beanibazar upazila in Sylhet district, was designated a land port in 2015. The widening of the Sylhet-Sheola highway is expected to further enhance trade between the northeastern regions of Bangladesh and India.
A World Bank report noted that the existing Sylhet-Sheola two-lane road is unsafe, poorly paved, and congested with various types of vehicles. The new dual carriageway will improve safety by reducing accidents and streamlining traffic.
What's Your Reaction?
