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Why was river transportation disrupted after the 1947 partition of Bengal?
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West Bengal
A tea plantation in Western Dooars, northern West Bengal, India.
The 1947 partition of British India significantly disrupted river transportation in the region by creating new political borders that severed established trade routes.1
The division of Bengal into West Bengal (India) and East Pakistan (later Bangladesh) virtually halted the large-scale trade of jute and tea that had previously been transported via inland waterways from Assam to Kolkata. This geopolitical shift, combined with the ongoing physical deterioration of river channels, fundamentally undermined the efficiency and connectivity of the existing water-transport system.12