India didn’t reply in four months

Diplomatic Correspondent  :
In the middle of March, Bangladesh foreign ministry sent a note verbale to India, seeking information about media reports which said that West Bengal government initiated a project to divert water from the Teesta, but the foreign ministry still did not get its reply.

“We still did not any reply from India regarding the note verbale,” said Foreign Ministry’s Spokesperson Sheheli Sabrin during a weekly press briefing on Thursday.
She, however, said that there was a development regarding the sharing of Teesta River waters as the Parliamentary Committee on India’s External Affairs submitted a report about it to the Indian government.

“On July 25, the Parliamentary Committee on India’s External Affairs submitted their 22nd report to the Indian government. In the report, they proposed strengthening Bangladesh-India relations and initiating meaningful discussions with Bangladesh regarding the sharing of Teesta River waters,” she said.
“The recommendation has caught our attention, and we are aware of the matter from our Delhi mission. This subject is both promising and significant,” the Spokesperson said.
She further mentioned that the parliamentary committee included members from various Indian political parties, such as the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Indian National Congress, and others.
“Hence, such a proposal carries a message of hope among us. We hope that quoting this proposal will lead to more robust diplomatic efforts with the Indian authorities in the coming days,” she said.

Teesta River is always considered the lifeline of the northern part of Bangladesh as the river spans a number of districts and enlivens the dry lands of those areas.
Farmers of those districts are dependent on the water of Teesta for irrigation. Apart from it, the biodiversity of the area is solely dependent on the river.
Because of a number of India hydro-electric projects on the upper riparian of the transboundary Teesta River, India has chocked the free flow of water on the river. As a result, a vast land of lower riparian region in Bangladesh remains dry most of the time.

The Teesta Water Sharing deal is still pending for decades due to reservation of West Bengal government. Consequently Bangladesh is not getting its fair share of water.
Amid such a situation, a new adventure taken by the West Bengal government to divert water by two canals in a bid to enliven their lands has created new concerns for Bangladesh.
In March this year, the English daily The Telegraph reported that within the framework of the Teesta barrage project, the Irrigation Department of West Bengal has acquired ownership of almost 1,000 acres of land for two more canal diggings.

The Jalpaiguri district administration has handed over the ownership of the land to the Irrigation Department in the presence of West Bengal State Irrigation Minister Partho Bhowmik.
As per Indian media reports, there are already 42 dams constructed on the Teesta, beginning from Sikkim.

Following such media report, Dhaka sent a note verbale to Delhi at that time to know about the veracity of the media report.
After several months, when the Foreign Ministry of Bangladesh was asked about the reply of the note verbale, its spokesperson said that the ministry still did not get any response of it.
Notes verbale are the commonest method of formal diplomatic communication between countries. They are used to convey information or requests of all kinds to another government.