India effectively demolished Pakistan’s “disinformation” campaign at the United Nations (UN) regarding the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) of 1960. It asserted that Islamabad violated its spirit, which is embodied in the Preamble of the Treaty, by inflicting three wars and thousands of terror attacks on India that seek to hold hostage lives of civilians, religious harmony and economic prosperity. Our western neighbour, jealous of our economic prosperity, has consistently used terror as an unstated policy to be employed against us, the Indian representative said during discussions at the UN.
“We are constrained to respond to the disinformation being carried out by the delegation of Pakistan with regard to the Indus Waters Treaty. India has always acted in a responsible manner as an upper riparian state,” India’s Permanent Representative to UN Ambassador Parvathaneni Harish has said. He was responding to unfounded and unsubstantiated allegations made by delegates from Pakistan regarding an alleged water war unleashed by keeping IWT in abeyance.
During the recent discussions, Ambassador Parvathaneni Harish noted that in 2012, terrorists had attacked the Tulbul Navigation Project in Jammu and Kashmir. The attack he was referring to was carried out by six Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) terrorists at a Wullar dredging site located at Adipora (in Bandipora district). The HM terrorists had shot at some workers at the project site, vandalised heavy machinery and equipment shouting that the work was a clear violation of rights of Pakistan as enshrined in the IWT.
This use of terror proxies to stop the work on Tulbul Navigation project clearly showed what policies Pakistan has been following for many years. Incidentally, the attack by HM terrorists had hampered the dredging works badly at that time, later in 2013 and 2014 also. On September 7, 2014, massive floods drowned large parts of Kashmir valley and experts said later that dredging the Wullar would have mitigated the situation. They thus blamed the HM terrorists of harming the ordinary Kashmiris by siding with Pakistan, purportedly helping it.
Ambassador Harish was addressing the UN Security Council Arria Formula meeting organised by the Permanent Mission of Slovenia on `‘Protecting Water in Armed Conflict – Protecting Civilian Lives’’. He highlighted four aspects to expose the “disinformation” by Pakistan, which spoke about India’s decision on the IWT.
In the wake of the horrific killings of two dozen Hindu males at Baisaran (Pahalgam) meadowsled, India had decided that the IWT would be held in abeyance with immediate effect until Pakistan “credibly and irrevocably abjures its support for cross-border terrorism’’. This condition puts onus of ending terrorism on Pakistan which shamelessly denies using its proxies to carry out civilian killings in India.
Harish told the UN meeting that India had entered into the IWT 65 years ago in good faith, by being extremely generous towards Pakistan. Incidentally, under the Treaty, Pakistan gets a total of 135.6 Million Acre Feet (MAF) of water of Western Rivers of Indus, Jhelum and the Chenab. India, on the other hand, gets only 32.7 MAF of waters from the three Eastern Rivers namely Ravi, Beas and Sutlej. Indian generosity is clear from this division of rivers of the Indus system whereby Pakistan gets over 80 per cent flows of the rivers and India less than 20 per cent.
Noting that the Preamble of the Treaty describes that it was concluded `‘in a spirit of goodwill and friendship’’, Harish said throughout these six and a half decades, “Pakistan has violated the spirit of the Treaty by inflicting three wars and thousands of terror attacks on India.” The Indian envoy underlined that in the last four decades, more than 20,000 Indian lives have been lost in terror attacks, the most recent of which was the dastardly targeted terror attack on Hindu tourists in Pahalgam.
The terrorist strike of April 22 has led to a situation where the tourist footfalls in Kashmir have nosedived. Just a couple of days before that day, the Kashmir valley was full of tourists who had thronged there to see the Tulip Garden at Zabarwan Hills. This terrorist attack on Hindu tourists had effectively demolished the argument that tourists were safe in Kashmir. It bears mention here that barring some attacks on Amarnath pilgrims, terrorists had not carried out any attacks on tourists in Jammu & Kashmir earlier.
Even as India has shown extraordinary patience and magnanimity throughout this period, Harish said Pakistan’s “state-sponsored cross-border terrorism in India seeks to hold hostage the lives of civilians, religious harmony and economic prosperity.”
Harish pointed out that India has formally asked Pakistan to discuss the modifications of the Treaty on several occasions in the past two years but Islamabad continues to reject these. The first notice for modification of the Treaty under Article XII (3) was given to Pakistan on January 25, 2023. One more notice under this article called “Final Provisions’’ was given to Pakistan on August 30, 2024, but was rejected by it disdainfully.
“Pakistan’s obstructionist approach continues to prevent the exercise of full utilisation of legitimate rights by India,” he said. Further, Harish said that in the past 65 years, far-reaching fundamental changes have taken place not only in terms of escalating security concerns through cross-border terror attacks but also growing requirements for producing clean energy, climate change and demographic change.
The Treaty needs to be updated by incorporating clauses regarding latest technologies regarding dam building, sediment flushing and several other connected matters, India has said on many occasions in the past decade or so. However, perhaps realising that it cannot get a more favourable Treaty if it enters re-negotiations, Pakistan has stonewalled all efforts by India urging it to be reasonable and come to the negotiations table. Senior Indian leaders, including Minister for External Affairs Dr S Jaishankar, has made it clear now that only issues that need to be discussed with Pakistan are terrorism and return of Pakistan Occupied Jammu Kashmir (POJK).
In a diplomatic offensive in the recent past, India has constituted teams of parliamentarians drawn from all parties and sent them world tour to explain its stand on cross-border terrorism and IWT. These teams are presently touring capitals of various nations, meeting political leaders as also journalists to convey India’s stance.
