Political Shadows on water of Indus (original) (raw)

Indus Water Treaty: Past Present and Future

2021

Natural resources are fundamental and imperative for the existence and evolution of human civilizations. Water being most important scarce natural resource has become a contentious political issue in the world. South Asia being a less connected and conflict ridden region, Water related conflicts have been a dominant area of concern. At the time of independence, the boundary line between the two newly created independent countries, i.e. Pakistan and India was drawn right across the Indus Basin, leaving Pakistan as the lower riparian. Dispute thus arose between the two countries regarding the utilization of irrigation waters from existing facilities. The negotiations held under the World Bank, culminated in the signing of Indus Waters Treaty in 1960. The paper will examine the historical background of the treaty; the contentious developments which have arose over the years and will also discuss the Kashmir perspective on the treaty. The paper will also evaluate the present disagreeing...

Indus Water Treaty and Water Scarcity in India: Implications for Pakistan

Journal of South Asian Studies

Pakistan has been facing a water crisis since the day it emerged on the map. The issue of the water crisis is deeply rooted in Pakistan's creation. The partition of the subcontinent not only divided the landmass between India and Pakistan but also the Indus River Basin. The rivers of the region were not entirely divided between the two states; they were rather shared. The water dispute was among the initial problems that created conflict between these two newly established countries. The Indus River Basin deeply affected the economy, society, culture, and political scenario of the subcontinent. Consequently, the water dispute is one of the major and initial conflicts that intertwine with the territorial disputes. The World Bank presented its proposal for the division of rivers. With the mediation of the World Bank, the Indus Water Treaty (IWT) was signed between Pakistan and India in 1960. Three Western rivers, the Indus, the Chenab, and the Jhelum, were to be given to Pakistan,...

Indus Basin Transboundary Water Issues in Past and Present Perspective 12 3

Indus basin river system comprises the main Indus and its five tributaries. Irrigation infrastructure in the basin makes it the largest contiguous block of irrigated agriculture in the world. At the time of partition of the sub-continent in 1947, boundaries between Pakistan and India were demarcated without due consideration of headwaters and their command areas. Resultantly, the rivers source waters and headworks of canals commanding huge area in Pakistan went under Indian control, giving rise to severe water sharing dispute. Inter-riparian negotiations failed but with the mediation of World Bank, Indus Water Treaty was finally signed in 1960. The treaty is comprehensive document whereby the three western rivers were allocated to Pakistan and the three eastern to India. The other provisions of the Treaty were constitution of Indus Water Commission, data exchange and dispute resolution mechanism. Over the years, the Treaty worked well for resolving transboundary water issues between the riparians. However, population growth and surging food and energy demands coupled with water scarcity gave rise to differences and disputes during the last couple of decades. This paper overviews water disputes between the two countries and sharing transboundary waters in the past and the present perspective. It highlights lacunae of the Treaty in the context of current era of climate change, environmental degradation and technological developments. It further suggests framing and implementing universal laws based upon equitable and fair sharing of transboundary waters all over the world for avoiding water wars.

Sharing water: engineering the Indus Water Treaty

Proceedings of the ICE - Civil Engineering, 2006

When Pakistan and India achieved independence in 1947, their boundaries and the disputed state of Kashmir lay directly across the vast and vital Indus river basin. This quickly led to a stillsimmering row over territorial rights and a similarly entrenched but more resolved conflict on water rights. During ten years of negotiations, which involved engineers rather than politicians and using the World Bank as mediator, the two countries finally concluded the Indus Water Treaty in 1960. This paper describes how the treaty was arrived at, its provisions for separate management and water sharing, the many, often massive, control schemes that have been built or attempted since and the lessons learned for future cross-border water disputes.

India, Pakistan, Water and the Indus Basin: Old Problems New Challenges

The Partition of India divided the largest contiguous gravity flow irrigation system on the planet, creating a new riparian relationship between India and Pakistan over the Indus Basin. Whilst the Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 has been successful in defining the rights of the riparians over the rivers of the Indus Basin for the past six decades, new challenges such as climate change and unsustainable groundwater mining are raising water- and food-security concerns that the Treaty was neither intended to nor envisioned to deal with. Emerging regional developments, such as China’s One Belt One Road Project and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor also challenge the fundamental regional security framework. In this paper, the emerging challenges of the Indus Basin are set against these new challenges as well as the past application of the Treaty. The review of the application of the Treaty reveals that while India and Pakistan make rights-based claims on the Treaty, they are willing to accept needs-based decisions, possibly opening new areas of consensus in trans-boundary water management. In examining this ageing Treaty’s limitations against these development, new transboundary water management challenges, and opportunities, emerge.

Averting Politics of Water: Indus Water Treaty in India-Pakistan Relation

Indus Water Treaty (IWT), is an agreement between Pakistan and India which describes the division of waters and management of drainage between the two countries. On 18 September 2016, the Uri Army Camp at Jammu and Kashmir face a major terrorist attack. After this, it was frequently circulated in the public domain and extensively discussed among intellectuals in the various platforms that whether water can once again serve as a weapon or as a strategic asset to control Pakistan aggressive policy. Some of the individuals have strongly advocated abrogating IWT with Pakistan. Finally, a strategic community of India come with the suggestions to maximizing the utilization of water under the formal procedure of the treaty. The IWT stand as world's unique successful example for conflict resolution. IWT between India-Pakistan is the only agreement that faces various war and short conflict. However, not subject to political mobilization. The treaty survives even in four wars, Siachen conflict, and the reoccurring military standoff. For the academic convenience, the paper has framed in three section such as History of Indus Water Treaty, Post-Uri attack and India-Pakistan Relation and final section propose to safeguard IWT. In other words, it can be said that the summarising the recent developments in terms of IWT between India-Pakistan relation is a primary objective of this paper.

indus water treaty

On September 19, 1960, India and Pakistan has signed Indus Water Treaty (IWT) over the water sharing of Indus basin. The water of Indus basin is divided between eastern and western rivers. The Eastern Rivers, whose use was exclusively given to India, flows through well defined legal territory which formed the part of the Indian Union created by the partition of the British-India. While the western rivers flowing through the disputed territory of Jammu and Kashmir. But the IWT gives exclusive rights to India over the use of waters from eastern rivers for any purposes; however the scope of J&K over western rivers is guided by IWT, which has snatched J&K's inherent rights over water. Subsequently the State of Jammu and Kashmir, which is mainly effected at the benefits of the two countries, could utilize through residual benefits of its resources to the optimum and deficits caused by the two agreeing parties. Due to restrictions imposed by IWT on tapping of water resources, the Jammu & Kashmir has been unable to grow to the optimum potential of its agriculture and electricity sectors. In this paper an attempt has made to examine the impact of Indus water treaty on Jammu & Kashmir's especially power sector. The paper provides a brief overview of Jammu and Kashmir and presents the current power situation in the state.

Challenges to Indus Waters Treaty and Options for Pakistan

Global Regional Review, 2019

The Indus water treaty was signed on 19th September 1960 by India and Pakistan under the aegis of the World Bank. Bilateral principles regarding water apportionment between both states were ensured by the Treaty. As a result, waters of the eastern rivers; Sutlej, Beas and Ravi, were assigned exclusively to India, while Pakistan received exclusive water rights of the western rivers; the Indus, Jhelum and Chenab but India is allowed to irrigate some specific land in Indian occupied Jammu and Kashmir and to generate hydroelectric power through run-off-the river projects. Following the Uri incident, the Indian government and media are generating ideas to discard the Indus water treaty. This paper focuses on legal and international implications if India attempts to unilaterally revoke the Treaty.