By A Staff Reporter
Kathmandu, July 10: India and Nepal have signed a letter of exchange to the Nepal-India Rail Services Agreement of 2004. A virtual ceremony was organised to exchange Notes Verbales and the signed copies of the letters between the governments of Nepal and India on Friday.
With the signing of the letter of exchange, all authorised cargo train operators including public and private container train operators, automobile freight train operators, special freight train operators or any other operator authorised by the Indian Railways will be able to use the Indian railway network to carry Nepal's containers and other freight – both bilateral between India and Nepal or third country from Indian ports to Nepal.
This liberalisation is expected to particularly reduce transportation costs for automobiles and other products which are carried in special wagons. Wagons owned by the Nepal Railway Company will also be authorised to carry Nepal-bound freight over the Indian Railways network as per India’s standards and procedures.
The letters also update several provisions of the Nepal-India Rail Services Agreement and bring them in line with the latest operational and infrastructure status of Nepali and Indian railway systems.
Dinesh Bhattarai, secretary at the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies (MoICS) along with Nilamber Acharya, ambassador of Nepal to India and Tirtha Raj Wagle, joint secretary (South Asia) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs attended the programme from the Nepal side whereas Sanjay Kumar Mohanty, member (Operations and Business Development) of the Ministry of Railways, Vinay Mohan Kwatra, ambassador of India to Nepal and Anurag Srivastava, joint secretary (North) of the Ministry of External Affairs attended from the Indian side. Also present were representatives from the Nepali and Indian embassies in each other’s countries and officials of the concerned ministries of both the governments.
Bhattarai said that the agreement would facilitate in Nepal's international trade with India and the third countries.
According to the MoICS, the agreement was materialised with decades-long efforts from Nepal.