Thaindian News

Dhaka, July 5 (IANS) At least 10 people, including five policemen, were injured Sunday when the members of a rights body clashed with the police outside the Indian high commission here, protesting the construction of Tipaimukh dam in India’s Manipur state.
The clash took place around 11:30 a.m. when the police barred the members of the organisation named ‘Lamp Post’ from entering the Indian high commission in down-town Gulshan area, police sub-inspector Mohammad Rafique told The Daily Star newspaper.

Police charged with batons to disperse them. Two protesters were arrested.

The clash took place amidst mounting protests over the dam that India proposes to construct over Barak river in Manipur.

Political parties have joined environmentalists in protests even as the Bangladesh government prepares to send a parliamentary delegation, including experts, to visit the site at Tipaimukh in northeastern India.

India mooted the proposal in May. Dhaka has not announced any date as yet as there are differences over the team.

Main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) wants to send a separate team to India.

Barak is shared by both South Asian neighbours. Sections of opinion-makers in lower riparian Bangladesh say their country stands to lose in terms of its share of water. The ecology would be affected in both countries, they say.

Dhaka wants to resolve the issue through talks. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has reminded that she has resolved an earlier dispute over the Ganga waters by signing a bilateral treaty in 1997.

India says it has shared information, but the protestors do not have even the basic data.

It also says that there is no international law or treaty to bar it from constructing the dam for generating electricity.

Indian High Commissioner Pinak Ranjan Chakraverty has been in the eye of a political storm after he observed that “some so-called experts” in Dhaka, who did not have even the basic data, were protesting against the project.