(Photo courtesy Ministry of Ports, Shipping, and Waterways X handle)
Dibrugarh (Assam), October 5 (IANS) A barge carrying 540 metric tons of methanol left from Bogibeel Terminal here on Monday for Bangladesh's Dhaka, marking the first cargo shipped from upper Assam to a foreign port since India's independence, nearly 70 years after the town's river ghat closed.
The methanol, produced by state-owned Assam Petro-Chemicals Ltd. (APCL) at Namrup, is bound for Pangaon Port in Dhaka. The vessel will travel about 768 kilometres down National Waterway-2 on the Brahmaputra River in India to the Indo-Bangladesh border, then continue along the Indo-Bangladesh Protocol Route (IBPR). The vessel will cover a total distance of 1,300 kms from Bogibeel, Dibrugarh to Narayanganj, Dhaka.
Union Minister of Ports, Shipping, and Waterways (MoPSW) Sarbananda Sonowal flagged off the vessel DLB Patkai, pushed by the tug Kushal Konwar, from Bogibeel. Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma joined the ceremony virtually.
The voyage is being observed as a test of whether the Brahmaputra can serve as a commercially viable freight corridor linking the Northeast to overseas markets. Regular methanol shipments to Bangladesh are planned. The shipment became possible after customs and immigration complexes were set up at Bogibeel and Dhubri recently.
"Our grandparents grew up hearing the steamer whistle at Dibrugarh Ghat. For 70 years, that whistle fell silent, and the ships stopped coming," Sonowal said. "Today, a ship leaves Dibrugarh for the world once again. The river never failed us. What it lacked for decades was the will to revive it.”
Sarma called it a proud day for Assam. "Assam's own product, made in Namrup, is now travelling to an international market on Assam's own river. The Northeast is no longer a frontier. It is India's gateway to the East," he noted.
Dibrugarh was once among the busiest river ports in eastern India. Government steamers reached the town from Calcutta, now Kolkata, by 1856. In 1882, the Dibru-Sadiya Railway began operating from the Dibrugarh steamer ghat. By 1913, steamers sailed up the Brahmaputra to the town daily, carrying tea, timber and passengers. The 1947 partition cut that route, forcing Assam's goods to pass through East Pakistan to reach Calcutta.
According to the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways (MoPSW), cargo on India's national waterways rose from 18 million metric tons in fiscal 2013-14 to 218 million metric tons in 2025-26. More than Rs 68 billion (about $770 million) is being invested in waterways across the Northeast, including development of National Waterway-2, a ship repair facility at Pandu, and last-mile connectivity to Pandu Port.
"Every ton we move on the river means less fuel burnt and fewer trucks on the highway," Sonowal said. He added that India is working with Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, and Myanmar on regional waterway links.
