Indus water treaty inherently unfair on India

The Indus Water Treaty signed in 1960 envisages the allocation of waters of the three eastern rivers — Ravi, Beas and Sutlej — to India and those of western rivers —Indus, Chenab and Jhelum — to Pakistan.

- Rahul Bhandari

The Indus Water Treaty signed in 1960 envisages the allocation of waters of the three eastern rivers — Ravi, Beas and Sutlej — to India and those of western rivers —Indus, Chenab and Jhelum — to Pakistan. India was allowed the limited usage from these rivers also for agriculture, irrigation, hydroelectric power generation. It allows India to irrigate 1.3 million acres of land and further permits India to store 3.60 MAF (million acre feet) of water for flood moderation, conservation and hydropower generation.

The treaty is an exceptional case in which India, an upper riparian state, has voluntarily agreed to surrender more than four times the amount of water to Pakistan, a lower riparian state, and imposed stringent restrictions on water use on itself, for the purposes of good neighbourly relations. Nearly 79% of the total available water in quantitative terms in the basin was allocated to Pakistan, whereas India, which has major basin area and is upper riparian, was only allocated only 21%.

Due to this, India has suffered huge loss both in terms of economic and agricultural development. India would have been qualified for at least 42.8% share of the waters of the Indus basin based on the criteria of population, drainage area and state of cultivated lands.