Assam shares only 263 kms of the 4096-km international boundary between India and Bangladesh, and construction of the barbed wire fence along it has remained incomplete due to various reasons.
Construction of the barbed-wire fence along the Assam stretch of the Indo-Bangladesh border would be completed by the end of 2016, union home minister Rajnath Singh announced in Karimganj on Sunday.
Singh, who arrived on a two-day visit to Assam on Sunday, visited one spot on the Indo-Bangla border in Karimganj, a district town in southern Assam, after which he said that the gaps that exist in some portions of the already installed border fence would also be completed within the year.
“The border fence will be completed within this year. There will be no dearth of funds for this. Moreover, certain gaps that exist in the already installed fence will also be filled up soon,” Singh told reporters after his hour-long visit to the Indo-Bangla border. He is visiting the Dhubri sector of the Indo-Bangla border in western Assam on Monday.
Assam shares only 263 kms of the 4096-km international boundary between India and Bangladesh, and construction of the barbed wire fence along it has remained incomplete due to various reasons. One of the most important reasons is that a little over 44 kms of the boundary passes through the Brahmaputra river.
Meawhile, Assam chief minister Tarun Gogoi has taken strong exception to a delegation of the All Assam Students’ Union (AASU) and some BJP leaders accompanying home minister Singh to the Karimganj sector of the Indo-Bangla border.
“It is strange that the home minister had taken with him some BJP party functionaries in his official visit to the Indo-Bangla border. How could he take along BJP party leaders in a government function? I am more surprised that the home minister did not bother to take any senior state government officer along,” Gogoi said.
On a delegation of AASU leaders accompanying the union home minister, Gogoi said in that case members of other youth and student groups should have been also taken along. “Why take along only AASU leaders? Why not leaders of other youth and students’ organizations?” he asked.
The AASU meanwhile has expressed happiness that the union home minister visited the Indo-Bangla border and assured completion of the border fence within 2016. “We are happy at his visit and announcement. Immediate sealing of the border is very important for India’s security. Both ordinary Bangladeshi people as well as fundamentalists and terrorists are infiltrating through the porous and poorly-guarded border,” AASU president Dipanka Nath said.
