The adoption of a Master Plan for Transport Connectivity by the leaders of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral, Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) member countries at the Colombo Summit has paved the way for realising the dream of seamless multimodal connectivity in the Asian sub-region with 1.5 billion population. India's Northeast is poised to benefit from the implementation of the projects, ongoing and new, under this Master Plan that covers ten years from 2018 to 2028. Key connectivity projects within the region and those with Bangladesh and Bhutan will turn the region into the focused area under the BIMSTEC Master Plan. The region also enjoys the geographic advantage of being the Gateway to Southeast Asia and thus becomes the bridge between South Asia and Southeast Asia under the BIMSTEC architecture. The sub-regional cooperation institutionalized in 1997 with India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, and Thailand as members have gained significance with the Russian-Ukraine war putting the spotlight on regional cooperation to cope with the new world order of multipolarity that has started evolving. India pledging one million dollars for augmenting the operational budget of the BIMSTEC secretariat is expected to infuse fresh momentum into various multilateral initiatives in the Bay of Bengal region including transport connectivity. The BIMSTEC Master Plan for Transport Connectivity prepared by the Asian Development Bank estimates the resources to implement the "flagship" or "signature" projects the at 47 billion dollars for 141 projects, including ongoing projects, and 22 billion dollars for 73 projects, excluding the ongoing projects with half or more of these amounts required in the roads and road transport. The Master Plan focuses on eight key areas of roads and road transport, railways and rail transport, ports and maritime transport, inland water transport, civil aviation and airport development, multimodal and intermodal transport, trade facilitation and human resource development. The ADB document states that while BIMSTEC's member states account for 3.8% of global trade and about 60% of BIMSTEC's combined GDP comes from trade, trade within BIMSTEC is relatively limited in importance except for the landlocked member states (Bhutan and Nepal). "Although the BIMSTEC region has been one of the fastest-growing economic regions in the world, intraregional trade accounts for only about 5% of total trade in the region, compared to 26% of the total trade within ASEAN, 52% of the total trade in the countries of the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement, and 58% of the total trade within the European Union," it adds to put in perspective the Master Plan in the larger ecosystem. The Master plan highlights that transport accounts for about 70% of the freight movement within the BIMSTEC region and dominates the overall regional transport system. BIMSTEC has one of the largest railway networks in the world, extending over 77,000 route-km, with systems in Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Thailand, according to the Master Plan. Regarding other connectivity advantages, it states that the region is also interconnected by both mainline and deep-sea container and feeder ships distributing containers throughout the region from hub ports and mentions about regional waterways between Bangladesh and India are the operation of over 350 flights linking regional destinations. A major constraint in regional connectivity in the BIMSTEC region, the Master Plan, identifies is "inadequate coordination between and among transport (sub)sectors and intermodal connectivity." The BIMSTEC regional transport connectivity Master Plan will support regional development by focusing on external regional and ultimately global linkages state the plan document released by the ADB this month. Some of the projects listed in the Master Plan having direct relevance to the northeast region include the Development of the India-Myanmar-Thailand Trilateral Highway connecting Moreh, the border town in Manipur with Mae Sot in Thailand via Myanmar, the Agartala-Akhaura rail link between India and Bangladesh and Kaladan Multimodal Transit Transport project for maritime connectivity through Myanmar. Implementation of these projects will facilitate seamless multimodal and intermodal transport in the BIMSTEC region and the northeast region is going to be directly benefited from the expeditious completion of these projects. The Master Plan emphasizes aligning domestic connectivity projects in member countries to transborder transport connectivity projects to ensure optimal gains and harness the potential for improved connectivity in the sub-region. It also underscores the importance of border infrastructures such as Integrated Check Posts developed by India at Akhaura, Moreh but points out the gap of such facilities not existing on the other side of the international border with Myanmar and Bangladesh. The strategy adopted in the plan to address such gaps is that BIMSTEC will encourage prioritization of the development of border infrastructure at the mainland border crossings including their development in national development plans and discussions with relevant national authorities and international development partners. The BIMSTEC Master Plan will help the north-eastern states region to look at their connectivity projects from a new perspective.