SHILLONG, Sept 20 - A four-day border coordination meeting between the Border Security Force (BSF) and the Border Guards Bangladesh (BGB) will begin here from September 24.
The meeting will be held between the BSF Inspector General and the BGB Region Commanders at the BSF�s frontier headquarters at Umpling.
According to officials, a 12-member Bangladesh delegation led by Md Zakir Hossain, will hold the meeting with a 13-member Indian delegation headed by Kuldeep Sani, Inspector General, Meghalaya Frontier.
The issue of constant objection of the BGB to the single-row fence (SRF) constructed along the Indo-Bangladesh border, 150 yards away from the Zero Line, will be discussed in the meeting.
BSF officials said the fence has been constructed as per a mutually agreed protocol. However, there has been constant objection from lower level BGB officials.
�This issue will be discussed during the meeting so that such objections are not raised against the SRF along the border,� a senior BSF official said.
A large tract of the 443-km border in Meghalaya with Bangladesh has been fenced to check entry of Bangladeshis into the country on the one hand and prevent militants from crossing over, on the other.
There are, however, several patches on which the border has remained unfenced due to various reasons. In some areas, it has been unfenced as the locals in India want the fence to come up from the Zero Line and not 150 yards from the border.
Meanwhile, the other prominent issue to be discussed will be cattle smuggling as Meghalaya has become a favoured route of cattle smuggling into Bangladesh. Besides, issues related to drug trafficking and attacks on BSF officials by Bangladeshi nationals will also be taken up during the meeting, the BSF official stated.
