Indo-Bangla friendship pipeline likely to be commissioned in February

The 130-km long Indo-Bangla Friendship Pipeline (IBFPL) is likely to be    commissioned in February
The international oil pipeline, IBFPL, will carry fuel from Numaligarh Refinery Ltd's (NRL) marketing terminal to the Parbatipur depot of Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC).

It is to be noted that the 130-km IBFPL was held in September 2018 in the presence of Prime Ministers of India and Bangladesh through video conferencing.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his meeting with Bangladesh Prime Minister Hasina in 2017 had agreed to finance this pipeline with a capacity of one million metric tonne per annum (MMTPA).
 The total project cost for construction of the IBFPL is Rs 377.08 crore. Out of this, NRL's investment is Rs 91.84 crore for the India portion of the pipeline, while the remaining Rs 285.24 crore for Bangladesh portion is being funded by the Indian government as grant-in-aid.

    According to a recent report, prepared by Assam Assembly on the visit of a delegation of the legislators to the neighbouring country, Bangladesh will start importing gas and oil from NRL later this year.

    The delegation met Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, who said that "importing fuel oil from India through pipeline" will start from this year, it added.

    "She said that Bangladesh wants to import oil from India through pipeline... The 130-km India-Bangladesh Friendship Pipeline (IBFPL) project aims to export oil products from India to Bangladesh," the report said.

    NRL and BPC had in April 2017 inked a long-term agreement for selling High Speed Diesel (HSD) from India to Bangladesh through the IBFPL.

    Later in October of the same year, the state-run NRL signed another 15-year agreement with the BPC for export of gas oil (diesel) to the neighbouring nation.
In NRL, Oil India Ltd has 69.63 per cent stake, while Assam Government and Engineers India Ltd have 26 per cent and 4.37 per cent holding respectively.