India Ups Security at Siliguri Corridor in North Bengal

The Chicken's Neck or Siliguri Corridor, a 50km long and 22km wide strip of land that is the only connection between mainland India and north Bengal and the entire Northeast, has emerged as a focus area for the Indian diplomatic and security establishments after the Indo-Pak tensions in the Western sector.

- SUPROTIM MUKHERJEE

The corridor connects eight states—Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim, and Tripura—to the rest of the country. Sandwiched between Nepal and Bangladesh, with Bhutan and China just a few hundred kilometres away, the Siliguri Corridor is vital for both civilian movement and military logistics. Any disruption to this route poses a direct threat to India's territorial integrity, making its security a top priority.

The corridor is crucial for transit and trade, domestic as well as international. One million vehicles—trucks, buses, SUVs, private cars, two-wheelers—use this corridor every day, transporting 2,400 metric tonnes of goods and generating Rs 142 crore of revenue.

Several oil and gas pipelines and electricity grids pass through this region.

Following the developments on the western front, multi-agency security drills are taking place at 31 places in Bengal. Out of these, 17 are for Chicken's Neck which is 13 kilometres at its narrowest point and 23 kilometres at its widest point. The length of the Chicken's Neck has Bihar's Kishanganj at one extremity and Siliguri at the other.

Several meetings have taken place between the Bengal government, security agencies, Central forces manning the International Border in Bengal, Central security agencies and Bureau of Civil Aviation.