A treaty was signed in the 1960s but implementation was held up by poor Indo-Pak relations, and court challenges by people in both countries. After Bangladeshi independence another treaty was signed in 1974, but again held up, particularly by Indian court challenges. 

The lease of the Tin Bigha corridor to Bangladesh, allowing access to its largest enclave Dahagram-Angarpota (which it was allowed to retain in compensation for giving up a claim on Berubari), was signed in 1982, but the corridor was not opened until 1992, and then only during alternate daylight hours (so as not to enclavise the Indian villages south of Dahagram, who were worried they would be cut off). By 2011 common-sense prevailed and the corridor was finally open 24 hours. 

Meanwhile nothing had occurred with regard to the other enclaves, despite Bangladesh constantly raising the matter with India. 

While the exchange is good news for the chhitmahalis, the people of the enclaves, it is a sad day for borders, because a 300-year old border, the world's most complicated, that pre-dated the British, will now be 'rationalised' as a result of India and Bangladesh being unable to work with each other, and live up to the example of their joint Mughal and British past. Frankly, the 'problems' on the border were more a function of centralised government byzantine bureaucratism in both countries than of any real disharmony amongst neighbouring families in the enclaves. If local (civil) authorities had been given the power to sort out issues locally, instead of referring them up the chain to Delhi/Dhaka, and involving foreign ministries, military and other non-locals, I believe things problems could have been sorted out. By requiring central government to sign off on everything, it forced issues to be escalated (often violently) before anyone in either capital would care. 

The enclaves provided a potential tourism drawcard for what is a peripheral region in both countries, giving opportunities for economic development that will now be lost [for the benefits of enclave tourism in otherwise peripheral regions, see the example of Baarle-Nassau on the Neth-Belgian border, which has many parallels, including the bloody war of independence of one country from the other, based on religious intolerance). Although the current thaw in relations appears to be moving forward on transit and other co-operations, which is good, I fear the enclave region will remain just another poor rice and jute growing area, and residents of both countries will remain separated even more 'securely' by India's border fence. The enclaves gave a window of opportunity to move beyond an us-and-them mentality in a region that for centuries before 1947 was united. While I am very happy that the enclave dwellers will now have access to their full rights as citizens, which will give them a certain economic boost, it is a loss all round for them, for the peoples of both countries, and for the world in general, that the two government have proved too blinkered by nationalism to grasp a unique opportunity to jointly develop the region, and prove harmony between their citizenries was possible. That the world will now lose its only counter-counter enclave, is as much a tragedy and as much an act of cultural vandalism as certain other such acts we have seen in recent months. 

That a simple issue such as allowing transit to Indian lorries and train through Bangladesh to Assam has proved unimplementable, in a region which under the British was unified, is incredibly sad. 

I only hope the enclave pillar won't be uprooted, so that daring tourists will still be able to trace the former boundary on foot, as they still can that of Moresnet , now in Belgium.