By Sudip Sharma Chowdhury

Guwahati : The 51st Director General level border coordination conference between Border Security Force (India) and Border Guard Bangladesh will be organized w.e.f 22nd to 26th Dec 2020. 2. During this conference, BSF delegation led by Shri Rakesh Asthana, Director General, BSF will hold alks with BGB delegation headed by Major General Md Shafeenul Islam, BGBM (BAR), ndc, psc, Director General, BGB. 3. The aim of the Director General Talks is to discuss border related issues, and to enable better coordination between both border guarding forces. 4. The conference will focus on addressing and streamlining mechanisms on how to jointly curb various trans-border crimes and timely sharing of information between both border guarding forces.

There will be deliberations on developmental and infrastructure works, joint efforts for effective implementation of Coordinated Border Management Plan (CBMP) and Confidence Building Measures (CBMs). 5. The last BSF – BGB border Coordination Conference was held from 16th to 19th September 2020 at Dhaka (Bangladesh). ORIGIN OF DG LEVEL BSF-BGB BORDER COORDINATION CONFERENCE The Joint India-Bangladesh guidelines for Border Authorities – 1975 envisage that there should be frequent contacts between the border authorities of the two concerned countries to discuss the matters of immediate administrative concern.

An Indian delegation under leadership of Shri Ashwani Kumar, former Director General of BSF and the Bangladesh delegation under the leadership of Major General Quazi Golam Dastgir, former Director General BDR (now BGB) met at Kolkata on 02nd December 1975 for the first time to discuss mutual border problems. Since then, the meetings between DG BSF and DG BGB were held annually alternatively in India and Bangladesh till 1993. During discussions between the Home Secretaries of India and Bangladesh that were held at Dhaka (Bangladesh) from Oct 7th to 9th, 1993, it was agreed that the Director General level meetings between BSF and BGB, were to be a bi-annual event. In the agreed summary of discussions during the said meeting, it was emphasized that problems in the areas of mutual interests and concerns could be progressively resolved through close contacts and continuing meaningful dialogue at various levels. Accordingly, DG BSF and DG BGB have been holding Border Coordination meetings twice a year alternatively at Delhi and Dhaka and joint record of discussions of these meetings are forwarded to Ministry of Home Affairs after each such meeting.