GS Paper: GS2

For the first time in 26 years, India and Bangladesh agreed to share the waters of a significant transboundary river, the Kushiyara, while negotiations over a long-delayed agreement to share the Teesta River’s waters, which are politically sensitive are still ongoing.

India-Bangla water disputes: A backgrounder

• The Teesta River and the Ganges River dispute are the two main long-standing water conflicts between India and Bangladesh.
• Both rivers are important supplies of water for fishermen, farmers, and boatmen in both nations.
• Since the sacred river flows from India to Bangladesh, the Ganga river dispute has been a source of contention between the two countries for the past 35 years.
• There hasn’t been a long-term solution for sharing water offered despite several rounds of bilateral negotiations failing.
• In order to establish a water sharing arrangement for the following 30 years, a treaty was signed in 1996. This deal is about to expire.

What is the Kushiyara River Treaty?

• The first such deal since the 1996 signing of the Ganga water treaty, India and Bangladesh reached an interim agreement on water sharing for the Kushiyara River.
• India withdrew its objection to withdrawal of Kushiyara’s waters by Bangladesh through the Rahimpur Canal.
• Over the last century, the flow of the Barak river has changed in such a way that the bulk of the river’s water flows into Kushiyara while the rest goes into Surma.
• The agreement is aimed at addressing part of the problem that the changing nature of the river has posed before Bangladesh as it unleashes floods during the monsoon.
• It goes dry during the winter when demand of water goes up because of a crop cycle in Sylhet.

Terms of the treaty

• Under this MoU, Bangladesh will be able to withdraw 153 cusecs (cubic feet per second) of water from the Kushiyara out of the approximately 2,500 cusecs of water that is there in the river during the winter season.
• The agreement addresses Bangladesh’s concern over water supply along the river, during the winter months but flood control in the basin of Kushiyara is expected to require much more work.

How will Bangladesh use the water?

• The water of Kushiyara will be channelled through the Rahimpur Canal project in Sylhet.
• The eight km long canal is the only supplier of water from the Kushiyara to the region and Bangladesh has built a pump house and other facilities for withdrawal of water that can now be utilised.

Benefits to Bangladesh

• It is generally understood that approximately 10,000 hectares of land and millions of people will benefit from the water that will flow through a network of canals in Sylhet.
• It will benefit the farmers involved in Boro rice, which is basically the rice cultivated during the dry season of December to February and harvested in early summer.
• Bangladesh has been complaining that the Boro rice cultivation in the region had been suffering as India did not allow it to withdraw the required water from the Kushiyara.

Why is the water from the Kushiyara so important for Rahimpur Canal?

• The water of the Kushiyara has been used for centuries in Sylhet’s subdivisions like the Zakiganj, Kanaighat and Beanibazar areas.
• But Bangladesh has witnessed that the flow and volume of water in the canal has reduced during the lean season.
• The utility of the river and the canal during the lean/winter season had gone down, affecting cultivation of rice as well as a wide variety of vegetables for which Sylhet is famous.

What was India’s objection to the Rahimpur Canal?

• India objected to the clearing and dredging of canal.
• It claimed that the dyke and other infrastructure interfered in border security as Kushiyara itself forms part of the border between the two sides.
• However, the agreement indicates that the economic benefits possible from the river outweighed the security

What are the hurdles to the Teesta agreement?

• The Kushiyara agreement is relatively smaller in scale in comparison to Teesta that involves West Bengal, which has problems with the proposal.
• The Kushiyara agreement did not require a nod from any of the States like Assam from which the Barak emerges and branches into Kushiyara and Surma.

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Prime Minister Modi has tweeted his condolences and hoped for an early restoration of normalcy in flood devastated Pakistan.

Why in news?

• The statement by the PM last month came as a surprise to many.
• This is on the grounds of steady deterioration of ties over the last eight years since Modi came to power.

PM Modi and Pakistan

(A) Early failure

• PM Modi had famously begun his tenure with an invitation to Pakistan’s then PM Nawaz Sharif for the swearing-in ceremony in May 2014.
• Sharif had come to India, along with the leaders of other SAARC nations.
• This gesture promised a new beginning for the bilateral relationship that had suffered a severe setback after the 26/11 terrorist attacks in Mumbai in 2008.
• However, a string of incidents followed, the terrorist attacks in Pathankot and Uri — impacted the relationship negatively, and New Delhi made it clear that “talks and terror can’t go together”.

(B) India strengthens resolute

• Ties have been hit further over the last few years, especially after the Pulwama terror attack in February 2019, and the abrogation of Article 370 in August that year.
• That led to the downsizing of the High Commissions in both capitals; there are no full-time High Commissioners in either country now.

Change of PM in Pak

• After the ouster of Imran Khan, and the coming to power of the new coalition government led by PM Shehbaz Sharif, some positive noises have emanated from Islamabad.
• India however reiterated the desired peace and stability in a region free of terrorism.
• New Pak PM criticized his predecessor, Imran Khan, for not making “serious and diplomatic efforts” when India abrogated Article 370 in August 2019.

Responses to disasters

In the past, when natural disasters struck India and Pakistan, the two countries at times reached out to each other with offers of help.

• Bhuj earthquake: For example, in January-February 2001, after the earthquake hit Bhuj in Gujarat, Pakistan had reached out with help, and had sent tents and blankets for the survivors.
• 2005 earthquake: A powerful earthquake struck both India and Pakistan, India sent aircraft with relief supplies to Pakistan and pledged $ 25 million through the United Nations to support Pakistan’s relief efforts.

In 2010, when a “superflood” — the worst in recent decades until the deluge of 2022 — hit Pakistan, India offered $ 5 million in help, but Islamabad declined to accept it.

The case for help now

• Though there has not been much follow-up activity, the PM Modi’s outreach by way of a message created a potential opening for “disaster diplomacy”.
• Pakistan’s Finance Minister said that the government can consider importing vegetables and other edible items from India following the destruction of standing crops due to the floods.
• Prices of vegetables and fruit have gone through the roof as supplies from Balochistan, Sindh, and south Punjab especially, have been badly affected.

Why should India respond?

• For the Indian government, the case for extending humanitarian help ties in well with its desire to project itself as the “first responder” in times of disaster and crisis in the neighbourhood.
• In recent months and years, India has extended its hand of help and cooperation to the Maldives, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Nepal, Bhutan, and Afghanistan.
• Trucks filled with Indian grain have travelled to Taliban-ruled Afghanistan via Pakistan.

What is Pakistan’s position?

• Pakistan’s establishment (none other but Pak Army) has discussed the possibility of getting food grains through international organisations, who want to send relief material from India.
• The help from India can be at the micro and short-term level: food, fuel, tents, medicines, and emergency essential supplies.
• At the macro and medium-to-long-term, it could involve help in the reconstruction of damaged homes and properties, and the archaeological site of Mohenjo Daro, part of the cultural heritage of both countries.
• India’s healthcare can be of help in the post-floods scenario — dengue is already on the rise, and diseases such as typhoid are expected to spike sharply.

Issues in re-engagement

• Some in the Indian establishment believe that the government’s stated policy of talks and terror can’t go together, and the extending of help to Pakistan are at odds with each other.
• For New Delhi, the decision is as much about projecting power as a global responder as with managing the ruling party’s domestic political base.

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