Zakiganj border
Altaf Ahmed Choudhury, Ballah, Zakiganj
Having studied in my village school up to class-vi and then at the Karimganj Govt High School up to matriculation in 1949, and then in Chittagong/Dhaka, I am aware of how the present border in the eastern part of Zakiganj thana was established with the whole Surma river becoming a part of India as an international boundary. This was because the river Surma was part of the neighbouring district Cachar during the British period. But what the Radcliff Award did was that it sliced out a portion of the richest sub-division with the headquarters at Karimganj and gave it to the neigbouring Cachar district of the then Assam/India. The most unjust thing was while creating a new boundary along the river Kushiara between the main portion of Sylhet they gave away this part of truncated Sylhet to India thus to give a corridor to Tripura. They conveniently forgot to mention midstream of the Surma to be the new boundary, instead of the whole river as was in the past. But at the same time Radcliff and the British government did not forget the international convention and made the new boundary of river Kushiara as the midstream to make it safe for India. While Congress leaders, particularly Mr. Nehru, were very alert about everything, our representatives were not that sharp. I know that lawyer Haimidul Haque Choudhury was our chief co-ordinator but he was ignorant of the said fact like most of the people in Bengal did not know much about the details of Sylhet. Thus there was a lapse in demarcation of the midstream of the Surma from the point of bifurcation of the Barak River near Alamshid and down the river Surma up to Moricha village, under Zakiganj upazila, where the river Surma wholly entered into Bangladesh territory. Since it is internationally recognised that the midstream of a border river shall be the actual demarcation line between two states, it would be very easy to settle all unnecessary disputes / clashes if India graciously agree to correct the mistake Radcliff and the then British government committed in 1947. I appeal to the Indian government to agree to this solution and ensure that the people of Bangladesh and India along both sides of the border river Surma live in peace .
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