LIFE revolves around water. Like all areas of great human population, the Indian subcontinent is built around water resources – principally rivers. Mohenjodaro, the great civilization that spanned northwest India, was built around river systems – the Indus and, contemporary research seems to suggest, the Saraswati. Later, urban civilization spread to other riverine belts, primarily the Ganga.

Today, water plays a key role in sustaining the huge population of the subcontinent and providing it a social, cultural and economic fabric. Water is used for agriculture and hydropower, as well as to sustain the lives of people living in both rural and urban environments. This water comes through rivers, rainfall, as well as historical aquifers and is usually aggregated as a particular river basin. As of now, on a per capita basis, there is enough water for the huge population of the Ganga-Brahmaputra basin, but its availability varies through the dry season, as well as because of poor distribution systems. But with growing demands from rising populations and the growth of cities this is set to change and, hence, the urgency in working out means, primarily through regional cooperation, that will ensure sufficiency of water for agriculture, industry and human consumption in the coming decades.

If there is one uniform characteristic of the people of the basin, it is their poverty, both personal and in terms of resources. Beyond the issues of poor water management, chronic poverty and disease, the people of the region must now confront the possibility that they will have to bear the brunt of climate change. According to experts, climate change could enhance variability of the monsoon, as well as bring on spikes in rainfall leading to flash floods or prolonged dry spells leading to drought. In addition, countries like Bangladesh would be prone to be affected by the rise of the sea levels and land erosion.

The Ganga and some of its tributaries rise in the Uttarakhand Himalaya, but many of its significant tributaries originate in Nepal or Tibet. The drainage area of its basin is roughly 1,080,000 sq kms and is shared by China, India, Nepal and Bangladesh. During the monsoon, there is abundant water, but in the dry season, there is scarcity. The role of rivers that flow through Nepal, some originating in Tibet, is vital for the Ganga basin, which is itself better seen as a composite Ganga-Brahmaputra basin. The four large tributaries of the Ganga – Kali, Karnali, Gandak and Kosi – and five smaller rivers, contribute 46% of the water flow at Farakka, actually according to some accounts, 75% in the lean season.

 

India is the dominant user of the water resources of the Ganga. The people of the Gangetic plain gain from the bounty of the rivers that constitute the system, but are also ravaged by floods in the monsoon and drought when it fails. In essence, however, the people depend on the monsoon which feeds the rivers and also directly irrigates the land. But this precipitation comes in a short period of four months, and for the rest of the year the challenge is to effectively manage water resources for irrigation, as well as industry and consumption.

The Ganga-Brahmaputra basin spreads across different states of the Indian subcontinent – Nepal, Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Pakistan – in addition to China. Regional cooperation is required not just to mitigate possible consequences of climate change, but also to maximise the use of the water resources in a sustainable fashion. This involves managing entire river basins which would enable the construction of storage and distribution systems which could also double up as facilities that could generate hydropower and provide for flood control.

The best known instance of regional cooperation is the Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 which has endured despite the numerous crises, including wars, between its signatories, India and Pakistan. However, the story elsewhere has not been so inspiring. Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal and Pakistan, share 20 major rivers among themselves, but barring the Indus Waters Treaty and the pact on sharing the Ganga waters between India and Bangladesh, there is no agreement on how river waters can be shared.

 

Sharing water resources in not just a matter of dividing the water resources through some formulae, but of data collection, analysis and joint surveys and exploration and, followed by this, the creation of storage and distribution systems as well as undertaking watershed management. The special challenge for the regional states is to manage their water resources in a situation where availability is steadily declining and where climate change with uncertain effects looms over them. And they must do all this in the framework of their domestic politics and regional relationships.

But neither water nor climate issues are a serious part of the regional agreements such as the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc). In part this is because of India’s resistance to multilateralisation of what it sees as bilateral issues. On the other hand, India’s dispute with China over the state of Arunachal Pradesh cramps efforts to work out even bilateral arrangements in some areas.

But none of the countries can wait too long. While for the present, water is available, though seasonally scarce, rising populations, urban and agricultural demands and climate change could result in water scarcity in the coming years and so there is urgent need for the countries of the region to come up with win-win solutions.

 

International law is not a particularly useful guide here. It does not have the force of domestic law, and neither is there agreement on just what constitutes international law on the matter of river water sharing. There are several general principles of international law to allocate water within a river basin and to avoid disputes. But, sadly, they have proved difficult to apply and can often appear contradictory. Sharing is not easy, since in the case of rivers it is not a two-way process and is quick to be upset when the upper riparian feels the necessity to use the waters for irrigation, generate electricity, and human consumption leaving the lower riparian with the feeling that they have been deprived of their just share. In the event of scarcity, existing agreements often come under strain.

The Helsinki Rules on the Sharing of Waters of International Rivers (1966), superseded by the Berlin Rules on Water Resources (2004), lay down the general principles based on the right of all bordering nations to equitably share water resources based on customary usage, balancing variant needs and demands of bordering nations. These rules framed by the International Law Association have no enforcement mechanisms. The Helsinki Rules helped in the evolution of the Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Use of International Watercourses which was adopted by the UN in 1997, but since then it has not been ratified by the required 35 members to come into force. In any case none of the countries of South Asia or China have either signed or ratified it.

In essence the convention has sought to impose an obligation on states to take into account the impact of their action on other states who have an interest in a particular water resource. It encourages states to share these resources equitably, keeping in mind the variant issues such as population size and availability of other resources.

It required members to share information on the use of water between states with an interest on a water resource and for them to file objections if they find the actions of other states harmful to their interest. Clause 7 which committed states not to cause ‘significant harm’ to the interest of the other riparians was to be subject of negotiations between the states and if this failed, through arbitration or adjudication by bodies such as the International Court of Justice.

Though this clause may have been seen in the context of pollution or actions that could lead to flooding, it could, some legal specialists opined, also be invoked in the event a state sought to dam a river to generate electricity or use the waters for irrigation. However, whatever be the case, as of now there is no clear-cut guidance from the United Nations on the equitable sharing of water resources between states. In view of this, it is only international practice and the experience of various water sharing agreements that can serve as a template for agreements to share water resources.

 

India has a unique position among the countries of the region. It is a lower riparian in relation to the rivers flowing from Nepal, but an upper riparian for rivers flowing into Pakistan and Bangladesh. Many of India’s rivers are subject to bilateral treaties such as the Mahakali treaty which governs the use of the Kali river flowing from Nepal into India, the Ganga, which flows from India to Bangladesh and the Indus, in relation to Pakistan. Of these the Mahakali treaty is the most recent and therefore incorporates the concept of integrated development, though this has not quite worked the way it was intended. The Ganga agreement, too, is beset with discord, principally in relation to the Farakka barrage which Bangladesh says has reduced water flows downstream into the country.

India has tended to view the Ganga as an essentially Indian river and as a potential source of water in other parts of the country through, say, the controversial plan of linking all its rivers. But the fact is that Nepal is an important upper riparian and its rivers contribute the overwhelming bulk of the dry season flow of the river in the lower Gangetic plain till the point where the river leaves India and enters Bangladesh.

The subcontinent may have one of the more enduring and well-known international accords between two rather difficult partners – the Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 between India and Pakistan – but it is not quite a model of river water sharing. It has simply divided the waters of the various rivers instead of an integrated approach which would have been more beneficial in terms of conservation, water use and ecology.

 

It is difficult to divorce the issue of river waters from the larger issue of relations between India and the smaller states of South Asia, as well as the question of Sino-Indian relations. Thus, as in the case of Nepal and Bangladesh, the issue of sharing water resources is often caught up in domestic politics where their political parties use it to posture against India. On the other hand, given India’s difficult relations with China, where Tibetan issues have a certain salience, it would not be easy for the two countries to arrive at a common understanding on the river waters issue. Further, the fact that China claims the entire state of Arunachal, lend its own complication to the larger issue of Ganga-Brahmaputra basin development.

It is difficult, too, to divorce the water issue from domestic politics in India. As the example of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu show, water can be an extremely emotive issue. This is evident from the manner in which Mamata Banerjee torpedoed the proposed Teesta water sharing agreement between India and Bangladesh in 2012. Even so, in the past, New Delhi has taken a narrow India-centric view of the water issue, focusing on gains that India could make from a particular agreement, rather than adopting a holistic approach which might provide solutions that would have a measure of agreement across the borders in other states of the Ganga-Brahmaputra basin.

 

The Ganga river reaches the Bay of Bengal through Bangladesh. It is joined by the Brahmaputra and Meghna and forms a complex Ganga-Brahmaputra basin. The lower riparian country is often devastated by monsoon floods, and complains about an unfair share of water in the lean months.

A total of 54 rivers flow into Bangladesh from India, but the only one in which we have a water-sharing agreement is the Ganga. The water issue between India and Bangladesh goes back to 1951 when India decided to construct a barrage to divert water to flush the Hooghly. The barrage construction began in 1966 and started operating in 1975 and since then this has been a matter of contention. The two countries have two treaties (1977 and 1996) and two MoUs (in 1983 and 1985) to share the waters of the Ganga and work out ways of sharing the lean season flow.

The treaty of 1996, like that of 1977, covers the sharing of the Ganga waters between the so-called lean season covering 1 January and 31 May, since there is no need for a sharing agreement during the monsoon and its aftermath. On paper the treaty is equitable, providing for a 50:50 sharing, but its complicated formulae make this a questionable proposition, at least in the eyes of Bangladesh. However, despite the considerable detailing provided in the treaties, issues of contention remains. For example, the 1996 treaty does not guarantee Bangladesh a minimum lean season flow. There are other problems, too, including the lack of a clear-cut dispute settlement mechanism. Unlike the 1977 treaty, the 1996 treaty does not provide for any measures to augment lean season flow. Another aspect of the situation is that while Bangladesh is largely right in accusing India of ignoring its needs for water from the Ganga, it is also a fact that Bangladesh does not quite take into account the importance of the river to the people living upstream and the political discourse in India.

But the simple fact is that for augmenting the Ganga flow in a long-term sustainable manner, there is no alternative to a regional cooperation model involving other riparians like Nepal and China. Only this can reduce the shortage of water during the scarcity season and check the floods during the monsoon. In addition, cooperation in managing water resources could serve as a means of promoting cooperation in other spheres as well.

 

The Nepalese tributaries of the Ganga make it the mighty river it is when it enters Bangladesh. The snow-fed Kali/Mahakali/Sharda, Karnali, Gandaki and Kosi debouch into the Indo-Gangetic plain and are the principal source of the economic well-being of the people living in the region. However, these rivers can also be a source of sorrow through annual floods that come with the monsoon – the most recent being the 2008 floods on the Kosi. Two of the major tributaries of the Kosi originate in Tibet, as does the principal tributary of the Karnali. Abundant water resources and fast flowing rivers make for huge hydro-power potential. But Nepal has barely scratched the surface here and though it draws a large proportion of its power from hydro resources, the process of exploiting this potential has not been easy.

India and Nepal have had bilateral agreements on sharing water resources going back to the first agreement on the Sharda river dating to the 1920s. But in post-Independence India, the first major agreement was the Kosi agreement of 1954 (amended in 1966), followed by another on the Gandak in 1959. India has gained disproportionately from the Kosi and Gandak treaties because the dams and barrages were developed primarily to irrigate and protect Indian land.

 

But the most complex and far reaching agreement was the treaty for the integrated development of the Mahakali signed in 1996. The last agreement was also more by way of an integrated development plan involving the Mahakali barrage, the Sharda and Tanakpur barrages and the Pancheswar dam, rather than a simple water sharing or flood control agreement. But none of these agreements have really worked the way they should, or even reached their full potential. This is because Nepal believes that they favour India and has not fully involved itself in their execution and has actually blocked projects that it feels will benefit India more. In the process, instead of exporting electricity to India, Nepal remains a net importer of electricity from India.

But there can be little doubt that given their location and nature, Nepal’s rivers provide the best, actually the only real, option for flood control and dry season augmentation through storage, for India and Bangladesh, as well as for the development of hydropower for its own development or for export.

 

China has been a marginal player in the Ganga basin issue since only a very small and insignificant portion of the Tibetan area bordering Nepal is part of the Ganga system. However, it is a major upper riparian for the Brahmaputra (called the Tsangpo in Tibet) and is therefore an important segment of the larger Ganga-Brahmaputra basin. Out of the total catchment area of 5,80,000 sq kms, 50.5% lies in Tibet, 33.6 in India, 8.1 in Bangladesh and 7.8 in Bhutan. However, according to the Central Water Commission, while 60% of the water in the Brahmaputra comes from India, 40% comes from Tibet. If India has ambitious plans to develop hydropower resources in the Brahmaputra basin, so does China in its part of the river.

China has built several dams on the Tsangpo which have consequences for India, though it claims that these are run of the river systems. More alarming are plans which are yet unclear, suggesting that China may be seeking to make a massive dam on the Great Bend (where the river takes a U-turn to enter the plains of Assam through Arunachal Pradesh) of the Tsangpo river which will generate a great deal of electricity. Further, there are projects to divert water from the river to the arid regions of China. Of course, in the case of the Brahmaputra, China and India are not the only actors. Bangladesh, too, depends on the Brahmaputra waters and is a lower riparian which could be affected by developments in both the Indian and Chinese portions of the river.

The need for advance information which could assist flood control work in India has led to efforts to obtain hydrological information from China on the flows in the Tsangpo/Brahmaputra and the Sutlej since the early 2000s. In recent times there has been concern in India about Chinese dam construction on the Tsangpo. China has sought to allay Indian concerns that its dams can affect water flows in the northeastern part of the country, but its action on the ground has been limited. In 2002, the two governments signed an agreement for the provision of hydrological information in respect to three stations on the Tsangpo between 1 June-15 October every year. This agreement has been periodically extended and is now current till 2018, and has been amended to provide data from 15 May instead of 1 June. A similar agreement in relation to the Sutlej was signed in 2005. Since then, the two sides have also set up an expert level mechanism (ELM) to discuss cooperation on trans-boundary rivers.

 

At the sixth meeting of the ELM in New Delhi in 2012, the two sides signed on a common agreement that they ‘recognized that transborder rivers and related natural resources and the environment are assets of immense value to the socio-economic development of all riparian countries.’ India has been pressing China to have either a water commission or an inter-governmental dialogue or an agreement to tackle water issues in relation to the Brahmaputra and the Sutlej, but Beijing has so far resisted this.

Following Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit in October 2013, another MoU was signed by the two sides appreciating the ELM arrangements and the older agreements as well as agreeing to ‘exchange views on other issues of mutual interest.’

But this is merely an MoU and does not mean that China will be willing to discuss the implications of its dams with India or Bangladesh, or share information with regard to its projects. What we can see, however, is that China is willing to discuss some of the issues of concern to countries like India, but it will be a while before discussions can result in substantive agreements and that hard diplomatic work remains to be done in the future.

 

In the area of water resources, notwithstanding the fact that theirs is the most fraught relationship, India and Pakistan have managed early enough in 1960 to work out a water sharing agreement in relation to the Indus basin. By and large and despite wars and other alarms, this agreement has held and disagreements, when they have arisen, have been resolved or are in the process of resolution through third party arbitration. Despite this, the issue of the Indus waters have remained contentious. For example, people in Kashmir complain about little consideration for their needs in the allocation of the river waters. On the other hand, water-stressed Pakistan continues to blame India for its problems.

So, before we look at the issues of the Ganga-Brahmaputra-Meghna basin, it needs to be emphasized that contemporary wisdom is that the issue is not so much about apportioning water resources – by itself a difficult task – as the larger integrated approach of developing them, whether for hydropower, irrigation or flood control, in a manner that benefits the river basin community.

Looking at South Asia, the big question that needs to be asked is: Do water resources determine the politics in the region, or is it politics which dictate how the region will deal with its water resources? For the present, the answer would be unambiguous – it is the politics. The politics of South Asia, are, however, shaped by its political geography which makes India the dominant subcontinental power, larger than all others combined and one which borders all of them, while none of them border each other.

This has shaped a political discourse in which India has often been seen as an overbearing neighbour who is unwilling to compromise for the benefit of all. Attacking India for slights, real or imagined, has been part of the politics of countries like Nepal, Bangladesh and, of course, Pakistan. We must not discount, either, the continuing political instability in Nepal and Bangladesh, two crucial states in the Ganga-Brahmaputra basin.

New Delhi is leery of entering into multilateral agreements on issues like water resource management where its smaller neighbours are likely to find common cause against New Delhi. This has blocked the obvious discussion that there can be over augmenting the lean season flow into Bangladesh. As we have noted earlier, storage systems in Nepal are perhaps the only option to do this, but so far there has been little discussion between the three South Asian states.

 

In looking at the issue of sharing water resources, we should not forget the element of history. India’s relations with Bangladesh have morphed over the decades since its creation originally as the eastern wing of Pakistan. Even in the last couple of decades, periodic bouts of political posturing by Dhaka has left New Delhi bemused. As for Nepal, it has evolved from a near-protectorate status in the early 1950s to a feistily independent country which is grappling with its transition from a monarchy to a republic.

But with the Chinese activity on the Tsangpo, India is now being made aware of the perils of being a lower riparian, minus any water sharing treaty or effective international law. Its efforts, the most recent in August 2013 during the India-China Strategic Dialogue, to persuade Beijing to have a separate mechanism to deal with the water issue have been met with a ‘less than enthusiastic’ response. Yet as the October 2013 MoU indicates, the Chinese have not quite slammed the door to the future.

New Delhi, too, has changed over the years. No doubt its early agreements with Nepal were, to put it politely, ‘India centric’. But over the years it has learnt the importance of concession and compromise on economic issues. However, India’s own economic conditions, as well as the relative decline of federal authority in India, has made agreements on water resources difficult, as evidenced by the fiasco on the Teesta water sharing pact in 2012.

It is perhaps time to take all these factors into account and try a different tack in working out new arrangements of sharing resources like water. Being by far the biggest power in the Ganga-Brahmaputra basin, India needs to take the lead in coming up with sustainable, win-win solutions to the water issue. The task is not an easy one, especially since it involves not only prickly smaller states, but also China, a power bigger than India.

There is need to expand and empower institutional mechanisms like the Joint Rivers Commission that India has with Bangladesh. The thrust has to be towards joint collaboration, enhanced transparency, not only on water flows, but plans and projects for the future. Of course, there is only so much that New Delhi can do. Kathmandu, Dhaka and Beijing must also play ball if we are to resolve the tangled issues that prevent the effective optimum usage of water resources in the Ganga-Brahmaputra basin. At the end of the day, the biggest challenge is to resolve the political issues – domestic and regional. Only politics with a benign regional bent will yield the kind of win-win solutions that the region needs.