Mamata to meet Hasina during three-day Bangladesh trip

Kolkata, Feb 18 (IANS) West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee is scheduled to call on Bangladesh President Md Abdul Hamid and Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina to discuss a host of issues during a three-day trip to the neighbouring nation beginning Thursday.

The talks would particularly focus on the contentious Teesta water sharing and land boundary agreements, which Banerjee had opposed in the past.

"There should be stronger cultural ties between the two Bengals. Hope this trip will make our bond stronger," Banerjee told media persons here Wednesday.

The chief minister will attend the main function at Dhaka's Shaheed Minar Feb 21, also the occasion of International Mother Language Day, which commemorates the martyrdom of Bangladesh youths during the Language Movement in 1952.

Banerjee said her government would build a replica of the Bhasha Shahid Smarak in Kolkata near the Birla Planetarium.

The chief minister received an invitation from Bangladesh Foreign Minister A.H. Mahmood Ali and would also attend a high tea hosted by him.

Diplomatic sources said the chief minister would address a business conclave organised by the India-Bangladesh Chamber of Commerce and Industry (IBCCI) in association with the Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI) and Indian Chamber of Commerce (ICC), Kolkata.

Banerjee would be visiting the Bangabandhu Memorial Museum in Dhanmondi and also be present at a reception hosted in her honour by the Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Pankaj Saran.

The chief minister, on her first visit to Bangladesh, is leading a delegation that includes senior ministers, high-level bureaucrats, cultural personalities and business leaders.

State Urban Development Minister Firhad Hakim, Tourism Minister and playwright Bratya Basu, actors-turned MPs Deb and Moonmoon Sen, and business magnates Harsh Neotia and J.P. Choudhury would be part of the entourage.