Foreign Secretary Shringla pays courtesy call on Hasina

Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla on Monday paid a courtesy call on Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina during which they reviewed issues of bilateral interests. Shringla called on Hasina at PM's official Ganobhaban residence here as part of his tour ahead of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's planned visit to Dhaka later this month.

"Various issues of bilateral interests featured during their meeting," Hasina's press secretary Ihsanul Karim told the media, without going into the details. Karim said issues of sub-regional connectivity were also prominently discussed at the meeting alongside Modi's upcoming Dhaka trip to join Hasina's father Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman’s birth centenary celebrations.

Shringla lauded Bangladesh's "astonishing successes" in improving socio-economic indices from infant mortality to women's education and from primary health to literacy. Earlier, Shringla met Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen who said Dhaka expects Delhi to understand Bangladesh's concerns about the recent developments in India over the National Register of Citizens (NRC) in Assam and the Citizenship Amendment Act.

Shringla said the current unrest in India over the CAA were "temporary" and will be settled soon. He reiterated New Delhi's assurance that NRC and CAA would have no impact on Bangladesh. "This (NRC) is a process that is entirely internal to India...You have our assurance on that count," he said.

Shringla also met his Bangladeshi counterpart during and held discussions on the plans for Modi's upcoming visit to Dhaka to inaugurate the birth centenary celebrations of the country's founder Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman..