PARBATIPUR, Bangladesh — Five thousand metric tonnes of diesel from India’s Numaligarh refinery in Assam reached the railhead depot in Dinajpur’s Parbatipur through a cross-border pipeline, the depot manager said.
Depot manager Ahsan Habib confirmed the delivery on Wednesday evening.
The diesel took 60 hours to travel through the pipeline from the Numaligarh refinery in India’s Assam to the railhead depot in Parbatipur, Habib said.
According to officials familiar with the project, Bangladesh and India signed a 15-year agreement on Oct. 22, 2017, to deliver diesel by pipeline to ensure fuel supply to eight agriculture-dependent northern districts.
The pipeline was built from the Numaligarh refinery near Siliguri in India’s Assam to Parbatipur in Dinajpur to avoid risks to railways and road transport during political programs.
Under the agreement, Bangladesh can import a total of 180,000 metric tonnes of diesel in 2026. The Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) has received 5,000 metric tonnes of diesel through February under that agreement. The cost of the diesel imports has been set at 1,462 crore taka (about $134 million). BPC will pay part of the amount from its own funds and the remainder through a bank loan.
BPC has sent a proposal through the energy ministry to import an additional 50,000 tonnes of diesel through the same pipeline over the next four months. India delivered 35,718 metric tonnes through the pipeline in 2023, 28,204 metric tonnes in 2024 and 124,216 metric tonnes in 2025.
বাংলায় মূল প্রতিবেদন পড়ুন · Read the original Bengali report