Agartala-Kolkata bus service via Dhaka from Friday

AGARTALA: The Agartala-Kolkata bus service via Dhaka, which was scheduled to begin today, has been postponed and would begin from Friday, Tripura Transport Minister Manik Dey said today.

"The bus service was scheduled to begin today but has been postponed to Friday (October 16) following the assault of an officer of Tripura Road Transport Corporation (TRTC) in Dhaka on Monday," Dey told reporters.

TRTC Liaison officer LJ Rokhum was in the Bangladesh capital on Monday to collect the road permit from that country for a new Volvo bus which would ply between Agartala and Kolkata via Dhaka when he was assaulted by some criminals.

"The criminals also snatched the road permit from Rokhum which he had obtained from the Bangladesh government," TRTC Managing Director Keshab Kar told reporters.

The assaulted officer had immediately spoken to the state Transport Secretary Samarjit Bhowmick, who took up the matter with the Indian High Commission in Dhaka.

Rokhum, however, managed to collect another set of permit and returned here yesterday, Kar said.

Dey said the External Affairs ministry was also informed of the incident and requested to take up the matter with Bangladesh to ensure safety and security of the passengers of the bus when it would pass through that country.

TRTC had purchased a 45-seater Volvo bus at a cost of around Rs 91 lakh for plying between Agartala to Kolkata via Dhaka, he added.

The Kolkata-Dhaka bus service was jointly flagged off by then Prime Minister Atal Vihari Vajpayee and Bangladesh Premier Sheikh Hasina on June 19, 1999 and the Agartala-Dhaka bus service launched in September 2003.

On June 6 during Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Dhaka visit Hasina and he had jointly flagged off the Dhaka-Shillong -Guwahati and Kolkata-Dhaka-Agartala bus services.