A cargo vessel carrying 540 metric tonnes of methanol has departed from Bogibeel Terminal on the Brahmaputra River in Dibrugarh, Assam, bound for Dhaka, marking the first commercial cargo shipment from upstream Assam to a foreign port since India’s independence in 1947.
The vessel began its journey on Monday in the presence of India’s Union Minister for Ports, Shipping and Waterways Sarbananda Sonowal, along with ministers, lawmakers and other officials. Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma joined the event virtually.
The methanol, produced by state-owned Assam Petro-Chemicals Ltd (APCL) at its Namrup plant, will be transported to Dhaka’s Pangaon Inland Container Terminal.
The vessel will travel about 768 kilometres along National Waterway-2 on the Brahmaputra before reaching the India-Bangladesh border. It will then continue through the India-Bangladesh Protocol Route (IBPR). The total distance from Bogibeel in Dibrugarh to Narayanganj is around 1,300 kilometres.
The voyage is being undertaken as a commercial trial to assess whether the Brahmaputra can serve as a viable freight corridor connecting India’s northeastern region with international markets through inland waterways.
Sonowal described the shipment as the revival of a historic river connection. He recalled that generations of people in Dibrugarh had grown up hearing steamers at the river port, which remained largely silent for about 70 years.
He said the movement of locally produced goods from Assam through the state’s own waterways to international markets demonstrated the strategic importance of the northeastern region as a gateway to the east.
Dibrugarh was once one of eastern India’s busiest river ports. Government steamers were reaching the city from Kolkata by 1856, while a rail connection between the Dibrugarh steamer ghat and Dibrugarh-Sadiya was established in 1882. By 1913, steamers carrying tea, timber and passengers were operating regularly along the Brahmaputra.
The Partition of 1947 disrupted the traditional waterway network, while the 1950 earthquake altered the riverbed around Dibrugarh. Regular cargo bookings from the Dibrugarh ghat were discontinued in 1954, and the port was eventually closed on October 15, 1956, as tea shipments increasingly shifted to rail.
Sonowal said transporting goods by river could reduce fuel consumption per tonne and ease pressure on highways by reducing dependence on trucks.
He added that India was working to strengthen regional inland-waterway connectivity with Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan and Myanmar.
The latest shipment involves the Inland Waterways Authority of India, Assam Petro-Chemicals, Cochin Bunkers Private Ltd and Bangladeshi partners, according to the report.
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