Reach Hasimara By Train: Hasimara is a town situated at a distance of 17 KMs from the Indo-Bhutan Border. In order to reach Hasimara, you will have to board a train from Kolkata. For North Indians, you can take a train from Delhi, Kanpur or Ranchi as mentioned earlier. You can visit the Indian railway website to know about the timing, duration & time-table of the trains. We had boarded the Kanchankanya Express from Kolkata which reached Hasimara at 10:30 AM in the morning.
Reach Jaigaon By Taxi/Bus: Jaigaon is the Indian town touching Indo-Bhutan Border. All the formalities to acquire permission, in order to enter Bhutan, will be carried out here at the immigration office. Every individual will have to acquire permission to enter Bhutan. You can take an Indian car in Bhutan, but you need a separate permit for the car. When you get a permit for Bhutan, it will only cover Thimpu & Paro. In case you want to go to Bumthang or any other distant destinations, you need a separate permit. You can take help of local tourist operators or do it yourself. Kindly note, you will have to provide a pre-decided itinerary to acquire the permit. In our case, we had taken help of a local tourist operator and he got all the essential permits quickly.
Documents you need to carry: To get your permit, you require either a Passport or Voter’s ID. Because of the friendly relations between India and Bhutan, you would not require Visa. In case you do not have a passport or Voter’s ID, please carry any other identity proof like driver’s license or Pan Card. You will have to visit the Indian immigration office and ask for the further procedure to acquire permit. They will provide you the assistance required. Once you have executed the required formalities, you can enter Bhutan and proceed according to the itinerary. In our case, by the time we got permits, it was quite late. Hence, we had to stay in Jaigaon for a night.