Days after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh suggested that India and Asean countries should finalise a transit transport agreement by 2015, the government on Tuesday said that the ambitious trilateral highway covering India, Myanmar and Thailand will get operational soon.
?We are working with the governments of Myanmar and Thailand to develop the trilateral highway, which, hopefully, will be completed soon,? said commerce & industry minister Anand Sharma. The highway will help in smoother and faster movement of goods between these regions.
Incidentally, Singh had suggested the extension of the India-Myanmar-Thailand Trilateral Highway to Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam.
Emphasising on the need to enhance road, air and sea connectivity, Sharma said that India is also working to develop the Kaladan multi-modal transport corridor, which comprises waterway and roadway. The Kaladan Multi-Modal Transit Transport Project will connect Kolkata with Sittwe port in Myanmar by sea; it will then link Sittwe to Mizoram via river and road transport.
Sharma said the project and the transport corridor will connect these countries (Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam and Mayanmar) with the Northeastern part of India. The idea of the highway ? from Moreh in Manipur to Mae Sot in Thailand, via Myanmar ? was conceived at the trilateral ministerial meeting on transport linkages in Yangon in April 2002.
The government is also looking at connecting India and Myanmar through a sea link, he added.