Bangladeshis fought for the Tinbigha corridor which links the Angrapota-Dahagram Bangladesh enclaves to the Bangladesh mainland. Like Farakka waters, the corridor became an emotive issue when the state BJP and Forward Bloc demonstrators sunk their ideological differences and laid down their lives together to prevent the opening of the corridor in 1992.
Chief minister Jyoti Basu, observers feel, opened it post haste, without even reading the terms of the treaty that came to be signed. For instance, Basu insisted that there was no provision for allowing the movement of any military equipment one way or the other. Kamal Guha of Forward Bloc explains: "There is a provision, on the other hand, that allows the movement of military stock, which could include anything from a gun to a tank, that publicity-hungry Indian leaders did not think right to check!"
For Bangladeshis like Abdul Khaleque (39), however, military movements are the least of their concerns. Their economic survival is threatened, now that the corridor has become operative. Says he: "Earlier our enclaves had much milk, fish and agricultural produce of all varieties, which we naturally sold at Indian markets. But now with Bangladesh authorities arriving and the Bangladesh Rifles taking up positions, things have changed. They don't allow us to sell our stuff to Indians. So our earnings have declined drastically and even meeting our costs has become difficult. Many farmers like me are working as daily labour these days, simply to keep body and soul together, because our earnings have dropped drastically. Authorities of both countries naturally did not take all this into account. Now the corridor, even as it helps our movement, is something of a problem for us."
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