PM flies to Kolkata tomorrow

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina will leave Dhaka for Kolkata tomorrow morning on a two-day official visit to India at the invitation of her Indian counterpart Narendra Modi.

During the visit, the premier will attend the Visva Bharati University Convocation at Shantiniketan as the guest of honour and will receive honorary Doctor of Literature (D.Litt) Degree from Kazi Nazrul University at Asansol in West Bengal.

Sheikh Hasina and Narendra Modi will jointly inaugurate the newly constructed Bangladesh Bhaban at Shantiniketan and hold a bilateral meeting there.

A Biman Bangladesh Airlines VVIP flight carrying the premier and her entourage members will take off from Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport here for Kolkata tomorrow morning.

The flight is scheduled to reach Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose International Airport in Kolkata at 9 am local time.

After the reception at the airport, Sheikh Hasina will go to Shantiniketan near Bolpur in Birbhum district of West Bengal, approximately 180 km north of Kolkata by a helicopter.

Vice Chancellor of Visva Bharati University Professor Sabuj Koli Sen will receive the prime minister at Shantiniketan, while Narendra Modi will welcome her later at Rabindra Bhaban of the university.

Then the Bangladesh prime minister will attend the convocation ceremony of the Bisva Bharati University as the guest of honour.

Visva Bharati University Chancellor and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Benarjee will also join the convocation.

Later, Sheikh Hasina and Narendra Modi will jointly open the newly constructed Bangladesh Bhaban at Shantiniketan.

The Bhaban has a modern theatre, display room, a large library for books on literature, culture, history and liberation war of Bangladesh and India, and books on Bangladesh-India relations.

Besides, two big murals of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman and Biswa Kabi Rabindranath Tagore have been set up at the two ends of its entrance.

After the inaugural ceremony of Bangladesh Bhaban, Sheikh Hasina and Narendra Modi will hold a bilateral meeting there. Issues of bilateral interest and international concerns are expected to come up for discussion.

From Shantniketan, the Bangladesh prime minister will return to Kolkata and will visit "Jorasanko Thakur Bari", the residence of Poet Rabindranath Tagore.

In the evening, Kolkata Chamber leaders are scheduled to call on Sheikh Hasina at her place of residence at Hotel Taj Bengal Kolkata.

On Saturday, the prime minister will go to Kazi Nazrul University at Asansol where she will be conferred with the honorary D. Litt Degree at a special convocation there.

Sheikh Hasina will deliver a speech at the ceremony and hand over gold medals among the meritorious students.

Besides, veteran Indian actress Sharmila Tagore will also be honoured with D Litt, while renowned physicist SM Yusuf of Bhabha Atomic Research Centre will be conferred an honorary D Sc degree at the programme.

Mamata Banerjee will be present at the convocation as the chief guest while West Bengal Governor Keshari Nath Tripathi will address the ceremony as the chancellor.

From there, Sheikh Hasina will return to Kolkata in the afternoon and will visit Netaji Shubhas Chandra Bose Museum at Netaji Bhaban, the ancestral home of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, a great patriot of the freedom movement in India.

The prime minister will return home on Saturday night.