Little Burma Jamaica: January 21, 2008 (Monday)

Indo-Burma Kaladan project to be inked in April

Nava Thakuria, 21 January 2008, Monday
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The agreement on the much-awaited Indo-Burma Kaladan project will be signed in April. The project will allow the northeast states of India to access commercial sea routes to ASEAN nations.

THE GOVERNMENT of India has gearing up for an agreement with its neighbour

Burma (Myanmar) for the widely discussed Kaladan project. New Delhi has been planning to develop a port in Sittwe, the capital of northwest Burma province of Rakhine (earlier known as Arakan). Called the Kaladan Multi-modal Project, it includes developing the Kaladan river to connect northeast India (through a road link from Kalewa in Burma to Aizawal) with the Bay of Bengal. The Sittwe is nearly 400 km from Mizoram’s capital Aizawal.

"The Kaladan project with a budget of $120 million will be a ’Build, Transfer and Use’ (BTU) project and will be financed by a grant by the government of India to its neighbour," said Jairam Ramesh, minister of state for Commerce. Speaking to journalists recently, Ramesh also added that a final agreement on the project is likely to be signed during a high-level Burmese delegations visit to India during April this year.

"New Delhi wants to connect the Northeast with the commercial sea routes. Moreover, with the development of Sittwe port and the Kaladan River as navigation efficient, the region is expected to have another viable access to the Association of South East Asian Nations," Ramesh had said during an earlier visit to the Northeast. He also said arrangements would allow the movement of cargo ships from Sittwe to any Indian port.

The Northeast - comprising Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Tripura and Sikkim - is surrounded by Nepal, Bhutan, Tibet (now a Chinese territory), Burma and Bangladesh. With a population of nearly 50 million, the region is connected to the mainland by the Chicken’s Neck in North Bengal. More precisely, only two per cent of the region’s territory is attached to the country.

Conceived and proposed by the Indian External Affairs ministry in 2003, the project - having obtained approval from the Planning Commission - has also been given the green signal by the Burmese government. The Kaladan flows from Mizoram to Sittwe (formerly Akyab) through another Burmese state called Chin (the capital city is Haka), and is the biggest waterway in the locality. The coastal region in western Burma is separated from the mainland by the Rakhine Yoma mountain range. Sittwe port, at the mouth of the Kaladan on the Rakhine coast, is an important harbour that emerged as a centre for rice export after British occupation in 1826. Earlier, it had a small fishing and farming community.

The Kaladan project that will include shipping, riverine and road transport, and is anticipated to be completed within four years and will include the construction of roads from Kalewa to Saiha (Mizoram border). Later, this road will be connected to India’s National Highway 54 in Mizoram. The project will be executed by India’s public sector organisation RITES (Rail India Technical Economic Services) and is expected to be commissioned by 2009.

New Delhi’s move to invest in a Burmese port assumes significance in view of Dhaka’s reluctance to give India access to Chittagong port, which is nearer the Northeast. Moreover, the Bangladesh government has been showing unwillingness to provide space to run a gas pipeline from Burma to the mainland India (Kolkata) through its territory. The Bangladeshi seaport in Chittagong is less than 200 km away from Agartala, the capital of Tripura.

However, India’s growing engagement with Burmese military government has turned out to be bitter-sweet for the Burmese pro-democracy movement. Burmese pro-democracy politicians want to see India’s involvement in Burma as a glimmer of hope for stopping Communist China’s ever increasing, but unwelcome influence on Burma. But on the other hand, Indian government’s current realpolitik approach towards Burma is causing disappointment among Burmese democrats who used to regard India as a good and reliable friend of democracy.