Islamabad, Pakistan- For more than 60 years, India and Pakistan have jointly managed the waters of six rivers in the Indus River Basin, which witnessed the birth of one of the oldest human civilizations.
Despite four wars and near-constant tensions between them, the South Asian neighbors used the Indus Water Treaty to irrigate the fertile lands on both sides of their border.
But the deal could become the latest flashpoint in the fragile relationship between New Delhi and Islamabad, with India sending notice to Pakistan seeking to renegotiate the terms of the treaty.
Indian media reports said that on September 18, India sent a formal notice to Pakistan, citing various concerns, including changes in demographics, environmental challenges, and other factors, demanding a re-evaluation of the treaty.
“India’s notification highlights fundamental and unforeseen changes in circumstances that require a reassessment of obligations under various articles of the Treaty,” the Indian notification said.
So what does this notice really mean? Why is the Indus Waters Treaty so important to both countries — and what lies ahead?
What is the Indus Waters Treaty?
Like many issues between India and Pakistan, the dispute over territorial waters has its roots in the partition of India in August 1947, when British rule ended and India and Pakistan emerged as sovereign states. The two countries, with a combined population of more than 1.6 billion, depend heavily on river water flowing from the Himalayas.
Since both countries depended on the same river systems for irrigation and agriculture, there was an urgent need to negotiate an equitable sharing of water resources, especially to resolve the issues of operating the integrated irrigation system in the Punjab – a province in which the British had invested heavily, but through which the new border separating India and Pakistan ran.
After nine years of discussions, facilitated by the World Bank, then Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and former Pakistani President Ayub Khan signed the Free Trade Agreement between the two countries. [PDF] In September 1960.
Under the treaty, India controls the three eastern rivers—the Ravi, the Sutlej, and the Beas—while Pakistan controls the three western rivers—the Jhelum, the Chenab, and the Indus. India is obliged to allow the waters of the western rivers to flow into Pakistan with limited exceptions.
The treaty allows India to develop hydropower projects on the western rivers under certain conditions. These projects must be “run-of-river,” meaning they cannot significantly alter the flow or storage of water, ensuring that Pakistan’s water rights as a riverine state are not adversely affected.
What does India want?
In short, India said it wanted to renegotiate the terms of the treaty.
According to Anutama Banerjee, a New Delhi-based political analyst, India believes the current terms of the treaty are inconsistent with it.
The Jhelum, Chenab and Indus rivers, which Pakistan has access to, contain far more water than the Ravi, Sutlej and Beas rivers, which India controls. In fact, Banerjee said, India has access to about 20% of the total water covered by the treaty, while Pakistan has access to the remaining 80%.
Limited access to water from rivers has become a major challenge for India as its population has risen in recent decades – it is now the most populous country in the world.
“India feels that the treaty does not take into account newer threats and concerns such as population pressures, climate change and its subsequent impacts within the scope of the treaty,” said Banerjee, a former fellow at the Washington, D.C.-based Stimson Center.
While India has not spelled out the specific changes it wants to make to the treaty, many analysts believe New Delhi will seek terms that would make it easier from now on to develop hydropower and other infrastructure on the western rivers whose waters Pakistan has rights to use.
Meanwhile, Pakistan has expressed concerns about the implementation of the treaty in recent years.
What does Pakistan want from the treaty?
Despite ongoing tensions between India and Pakistan, the Indian River project remained largely uncontroversial until the late 1990s when India announced plans to build the Baglihar hydroelectric project in Indian-administered Kashmir, on the Chenab River.
Recently, India has also built the Kishanganga Hydroelectric Power Plant on the Jhelum River.
“Pakistan’s argument is that the way India is designing these dams violates its absolute obligation to allow the water to flow,” said Ahmed Rifai Alam, a Lahore-based environmental lawyer.
On the other hand, India insists that its projects comply with the terms of the treaty. “India claims that if it intends to block the flow of water, it will have to flood its territory, which is not practical,” Alam added.
But formally, Pakistan has not sought any amendments to the treaty itself.
Pakistan’s foreign ministry spokesman Mumtaz Zahra Baloch said on Thursday that the treaty was the “gold standard” for bilateral treaties and added that Pakistan remained “fully committed” to its implementation.
“Pakistan believes that it is our collective responsibility to maintain ecological balance, protect our environment and avoid measures that may have adverse effects on the environment. Both countries have a mechanism of Indus Commissioners and we believe that all issues related to this treaty can be discussed in this mechanism,” Baloch said during her weekly press conference.
Where does the treaty fit into the broader India-Pakistan relationship?
This is an important part of it – and although it focuses on an artistic subject and is ultimately linked to a fundamental human issue, water, it was not immune to the geopolitics of the region.
In September 2016, militants attacked an Indian army base in Uri in Indian-administered Kashmir. At least 19 soldiers were killed. India blamed Pakistan for the attack, while Islamabad denied any role.
But in the wake of the attack, Indian officials said Prime Minister Narendra Modi suggested that New Delhi might exploit India’s position as a riparian state on the upper Indus River to punish Pakistan by imposing water restrictions. “Blood and water cannot flow together,” the officials told several Indian journalists.
“Any attempt to view water sharing as a purely technocratic issue divorced from political, geopolitical, and financial realities is simplistic and shortsighted,” says Iram Starr, a lecturer in the Sustainable Water Management Program at Tufts University.
“The Nile is controversial because of the geography and territorial control exercised by both countries,” Starr told Al Jazeera. “Rivers flow downstream, and Pakistan, as the downstream country, is heavily dependent on historical water flows.”
While the treaty itself is not controversial, its technical nature means there is little public understanding of its provisions, which in turn allows political stakeholders to use the treaty as bait to escalate tensions within India and Pakistan, said Banerjee, a New Delhi-based analyst.
“For example, we are only aware that India has requested an amendment or review of the treaty, but the details are not publicly available,” she told Al Jazeera.
What arguments did the two countries present?
According to Sattar, Pakistan’s position is that it has a historical right to the western rivers, as stipulated in the treaty. Pakistan has relied on these rivers to maintain its vast agricultural infrastructure since the colonial era.
But she says India’s position has gradually changed over recent decades, as it has sought to build more infrastructure to control more of the waters of the western rivers, primarily destined to flow into Pakistan.
“India is now increasingly claiming, as it appears to have done in its recent notice to Pakistan, that changing environmental realities, demographic shifts, and the overarching need for economic development and reliable, ‘greener’ energy supplies to meet its economic development needs mean that India wants to reopen the treaty to negotiate better terms for itself,” she said.
The treaty, says lawyer Alam, is the only transboundary treaty on Earth that “divides waters, not shares them.”
“All the other treaties talk about how to ‘share’ water that passes through many countries and how to respect water. But this remains the only agreement where water is ‘divided’,” he added.
In January 2023, India accused Pakistan of “intransigence” over the implementation of the treaty, after Islamabad repeatedly raised objections to hydropower projects India was building on western rivers, and took the matter to the Permanent Court of Arbitration based in The Hague.
India has rejected the jurisdiction of the Permanent Court of Arbitration over the dispute, arguing that Pakistan has first failed to exhaust other dispute resolution mechanisms in the Indus Waters Treaty.
What is the dispute resolution mechanism under the Treaty?
Under the Indus Basin Treaty, the two countries established a Permanent Indus Commission, comprising a commissioner from each side.
Minor disputes are handled by the committee, but unresolved issues can be referred to a neutral expert appointed by the World Bank, facilitating the dispute resolution mechanism provided for in the treaty.
Pakistan had initially sought the appointment of a neutral expert to settle the dispute over Indian projects on the western rivers, but later turned to the Permanent Court of Arbitration. Meanwhile, India sought the appointment of a neutral expert.
The World Bank decided in 2022 to appoint a neutral expert and allow arbitration proceedings in the Permanent Court of Arbitration. Only India participates in the neutral expert mediations.
Did the treaty achieve its purpose?
According to Starr, the Middle East peace process has been largely successful. But when you factor in issues of territorial control – particularly in Kashmir – the situation becomes more complicated.
The Kashmir Valley, a beautiful disputed region, has been the cause of multiple wars between India and Pakistan since 1947. Both countries claim the region in its entirety, although each administers parts of it.
“The IWT is designed to prevent the Kashmir conflict from escalating into a larger confrontation while ensuring that water issues are managed to some extent,” Starr said.
Alam also said he believed the treaty had largely served its purpose over the past six decades.
What is the future of the treaty?
Since India’s decision in August 2019 to revoke the autonomy of the Indian-administered part of Kashmir, relations between the two countries have deteriorated further.
Starr believes the best way to move forward with the treaty is to return to the “spirit” in which it was originally negotiated.
However, as India’s global influence continues to grow, Pakistan is likely to seek to enforce its water claims through international law, while India will use its geopolitical importance to assert its position, the academic said.
