Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has planned to make a 12-hour stopover on June 8 in New Delhi, India, on her way back home after wrapping up her tri-nation visit to Japan, Saudi Arabia and Finland.
There is likely to be a "goodwill exchange" between Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her Indian counterpart Narendra Modi during her brief stay in New Delhi, a diplomatic source said, suggesting that all needed to wait further to see things mature first, reports UNB.
The premier leaves Dhaka for Tokyo on Tuesday, from where she will go to Saudi Arabia.
On June 3, she will depart Jeddah for Helsinki, Finland, via Frankfurt.
Sheikh Hasina will meet the president of Finland at his official residence on June 4.
On June 7, she will leave Helsinki at 6:35pm (local time) for Dhaka by a Finnair flight.
On her way back home, the prime minister will make a stopover in New Delhi.
According to her tour schedule, she will land at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International Airport at 6:05am (local time) on June 8.
Hasina will leave Delhi for Dhaka on a Biman Bangladesh Airlines flight at 6:20pm (local time) and arrive here at 9:20pm (local time).
Foreign Minister Dr Momen said the prime minister will celebrate Eid-ul-Fitr abroad as she will return home on June 8.
Modi will take oath as Indian premier for the second term on May 30 at the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan.
Sheikh Hasina will be in Japan during the swearing-in ceremony. She could not attend the previous swearing-in ceremony of the Indian prime minister, as she was abroad then too.
Last time, Speaker Dr Shirin Sharmin Chaudhury attended Narendra Modi’s swearing-in ceremony.
Earlier, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her Indian counterpart Narendra Modi pledged to continue to raise the relationship between the two countries to an “unprecedented new heights.”
They underscored the importance of rapidly completing ongoing plans for deepening the partnership in security, trade, transportation, energy and people-to-people ties.
Doing so within the next three years will have specific significance, in view of the birth centenary of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman in 2020 and the 50th anniversary of Bangladesh’s Liberation in 2021, according to a media release issued by the Indian prime minister’s office.
The leaders also agreed to identify dates for a meeting at the earliest to resume work in service of the bilateral relationship.
Hasina became one of the first foreign leaders to congratulate the recently elected second-term Indian prime minister, thus reflecting the “extraordinarily close and cordial ties” between India and Bangladesh, and the excellent rapport that the two leaders enjoy, the release added.
She spoke to Modi on Thursday in order to extend her congratulations on the clear mandate given by the people of India to the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Meanwhile, Indian and Maldivian media on Sunday reported that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to visit the Maldives on his first bilateral tour.
But it could not yet be confirmed whether it would be Bangladesh or the Maldives that Modi would visit first as the freshly re-elected prime minister of India.
Bhutan was the first country Modi had visited in 2014 after becoming India’s prime minister.
Quoting diplomatic sources, Indian media said Modi is expected to travel to Male in the first half of June, while the Maldivian media reported that the visit would take place on June 7-8.
