India disbursed $120mn LOC money to Bangladesh in 2020 despite COVID-19 pandemic: Shringla

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, India disbursed $120 million in Line of Credit (LOC) money to Bangladesh last year, Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardha Shringla said on Wednesday. While speaking at a news briefing in Dhaka, Shringrla expressed satisfaction over the progress in LOC to Bangladesh. He also said that India extended $10 billion to Bangladesh which is at highly concessional credit terms. 

"We have made good progress in a line of credit (LOC), as Bangladesh accounts for almost a third of our line of credit. 10 billion dollars is what India extended to Bangladesh, which is at highly concessional credit terms. These lines of credit have contributed to enhancing our connectivity, infrastructure, not just at the border but different parts of Bangladesh," the Foreign Secretary said. 

“We are very satisfied with the progress of these lines of credit. We are going on further streamlining this, looking at another package,” Shringla said, adding, “Last year despite COVID we disbursed 120 million dollars in LOC money.”

India-Bangladesh 'better connected than ever'

Meanwhile, a day prior, the Foreign Secretary had also informed that despite the pandemic, bilateral trade between the two nations was at an unprecedented rate of 14% from USD 9.46 billion in 2019 to USD 10.78 billion in 2021. Shringla stated that Bangladesh is also “one of our most important" development partners both in terms of value and range of cooperation. “We extend our total global development assistance under lines of credit to Bangladesh,” he added.  

Additionally, Shringla said that the two countries have been extending various projects to bring direct benefits to the local community. India and Bangladesh are “better connected than ever before”. Road, rail, air, river and coastal connectivity is increasing and multi-model transports that utilise more than one of these channels is today very much possible, he said. Moreover, he added that joint energy space is steadily emerging and electricity grids are interconnected from east and west with more than 1160 megawatts of power way across from India and Bangladesh. 

(With inputs from ANI)