KOLKATA: India and
Bangladesh
were natural allies and Bangladesh would always remember India as a friend in need and the bilateral ties would grow deeper with time, said Bangladesh minister of state for foreign affairs
Shahriar Alam
.
Alam was speaking at the golden jubilee celebration of Independence Day of Bangladesh and 50 years of Indo-Bangla friendship along with birth centenary celebrations of Bangabandhu Shiekh Mujibur Rahaman at the Bangladesh deputy high commission.
Earlier in the day, he had an interactive session with the students of Sister Nivedita University, where he pointed out that the city had improved a lot under chief minister Mamata Banerjee.
At the Bangladesh deputy high commission, Alam said India, and particularly the people of Bengal, had sacrificed a lot for the Liberation War and had given shelter to millions and their sacrifice had not gone in vain as Bangladesh had turned out to be far ahead in GDP than their oppressor, Pakistan, which he described as "a failure in democracy". "Even though a majority of the people in Bangladesh are Muslims,
Shiekh Hasina
is the longest serving woman Prime Minister in the world." He added, "As India helped Bangladesh, we want to remain friends and can cooperate in areas of knowledge-sharing and social sectors."
The minister, who is in India in search of his roots, drove down to his ancestral homes at Kandi in Murshidabad. Later, he, along with his parents, visited several places in Birbhum. He was happy to be in Kirnahar. Alam pointed out the roads in Bengal were safe to drive, as people here followed traffic laws. "I took to the wheels and felt safe to drive. Had it not been the case, it would have been impossible for me to drive for several hours at a stretch." Even as he was impressed by the condition of the national highway, he said state roads were equally good. Appreciating the traffic norms being followed here, he said the system was better than that in Bangladesh. Alam plans to drive back to the border on Sunday.
Alam travelled from Rajshahi in Bangladesh to Kandi, where he met some of his relatives. He later drove to Birbhum, where he visited an old mosque his family used to visit. He even went to Katwa in East Burdwan and met some more of his family members.