The border haats at south Tripura’s Srinagar and Kamalasagar in Sepahijala district have remained shut since March 23, 2020, because of the Covid pandemic, despite repeated efforts by the central and state governments to reopen them.
Debraj Deb, Agartala: Tripura has requested Bangladesh authorities to reopen two border haats from Saturday, Industries and Commerce Minister Manoj Kanti Deb said on Wednesday. The border haats at south Tripura’s Srinagar and Kamalasagar in Sepahijala district have remained shut since March 23, 2020, because of the Covid pandemic, despite repeated efforts by the central and state governments to reopen them.
Replying to MLA Shankar Das in the Assembly, Deb said, “The Union Ministry for Commerce wanted the border haats reopened on June 16, 2020. Accordingly, we wrote to the chairmen of border haat management committees, but those could not be reopened due to the high prevalence of Covid-19 in the districts concerned. We wrote to them on March 23, 2021 to reopen them maintaining necessary guidelines, but the haats could not be reopened due to the high prevalence of Covid in Bangladesh at the time.”
After Covid eased in the neighbouring country, the government wrote to the ministry on February 22, 2022 for facilitating dialogue with Bangladesh to reopen the haats. The Department of Industries and Commerce also wrote to haat management committees on March 16 to take up the reopening with district authorities in Bangladesh. “We are hopeful that the border haats can be reopened after approval is secured from Bangladesh authorities,” the minister said.
Border haats are unique duty-free trading spaces between the two countries where locally grown products are sold to people living within the radius of five kilometres on specific days.
Tripura shares an 856-km international border with Bangladesh, 67 km of which is still unfenced in different patches. India exports Rs 100 crore’s worth of goods and imports goods worth Rs 600 crore through Tripura. The export volume from Tripura to Bangladesh has increased since 2020, when it was Rs 30 crore.
Earlier in February, Chief Minister Biplab Kumar Deb laid the foundation stone for a border haat at Kamalpur-Kurmaghat in Dhalai district. The state government has plans to start more haats along the Indo-Bangla border. Among these, one is expected to be opened at Dharmanagar in North Tripura district this year. In February 2020, Indian and Bangladeshi authorities jointly identified locations for three border haats at Paharmura in Khowai, Jagarampur in Sepahijala and Bamutia in West Tripura. Proposals for these three haats were later submitted to higher authorities. And the state already has got approval to open border haats at Raghna in North Tripura district’s Dharmanagar and Kamalpur in Dhalai district.
