East zone (Joydevpur) and West Zone (Rajshahi) was started. In 2008, direct passenger train “Maitree Express” between Dhaka and Kolkata was established. From 14 April 2009, BG Trains started coming to Dhaka directly after Dhaka-Joydevpur section was converted into dual gauge. With 3,800 kilometers of navigable rivers during the dry season and 6,000 kilometers during the monsoon season, the waterway network in Bangladesh remained an important part of the transport network. As of 2005, inland water transport was accounting for 8% of the passenger transport and 16% of the freight transport across all forms of ground transport in Bangladesh. With multiple private sector carriers in operation along with the national carrier Biman, air transport sector finally started to take off in this decade. As of 1999, there were 5,900 registered carrier departures worldwide which increased to 16,399 by 2009. During the same period number of passenger carried increased from 1.22 million to about 1.41 million per annum. Telecommunication In 2000 BTTB went into Global Telecom Service (GTS) Telex Exchange venture with British Teleco. The next year Telecommunication Act was enacted, to establish Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC). In 2002 the Government issued ICT Policy. From earlier decade 3 mobile operators, namely Citycell, GrameenPhone and Aktel were in operation in Bangladesh. in 2004, BTTB owned Teletalk cellular mobile launched. Next year, Egypt-based Orascom acquired Sheba Telecom and launched Banglalink. In the beginning of the decade there were 491,303 fixed telephone line subscription in the country - which increased to 1,234,895 by the end signifying 0.82 lines per 100 people. However, there was rapid growth in mobile cellular subscriptions in this decade. By 2009 there were 51,359,315 mobile subscriptions signifying 34.14 lines per 100 people. Energy In 2000 per capital electric power consumption was 101.5 kWh, which increased to 219.2 kWh by 2009. During the same period per capita energy usage increased from 138.8 kg of oil equivalent to 187.3 kg and fossil fuel energy consumption increased from 57.9% to 69.0% of total. In the year 2000, the electricity produced in the country was coming from: hydroelectric sources: 4.7%, natural gas sources: 88.8%, oil sources: 6.5% and coal sources: 0.0%. By 2009 the distribution changed to hydroelectric sources: 1.1%, natural gas sources: 91.6%, oil sources: 4.3% and coal sources: 2.9%. On 7 January 2005, there was an accidental blowout at the Chhatak gas field at Tengratial - just a few days after