Sixty years ago the Indus Canal waters treaty (IWT) was signed between India and Pakistan. And despite three wars, the infrastructure created by this treaty has survive unscathed. A searching article traces the history of this treaty and how it may hold the key for a resolution of the Kashmir conflict.
The fact is that water is the hidden driver of South Asia's most dangerous territorial dispute of Kashmir. According to David Lilllienthal, " The struggle for Kashmir was motivated in large part by Pakistan's desperation to control the rivers that flowed through the region."
India and Pakistan signed the IWT in 1960, after protracted negotiations facilitated by the World Bank Before the partition of British India in 1947, each province had jurisdiction to build dams and other infrastructure for electricity and irrigation on the portions of the rivers that flowed through their land; after partition, a series of patchwork agreements left several key issues, such as whether and how much Pakistan should pay India for water and canal maintenance costs, unresolved. The IWT gave "unrestricted use" of the basin's thee western rivers (the Indus, the Jhelum, and the Chenab) to Pakistan and the three eastern rivers (the Ravi, the Beas, and the Sutlej) to India. Today, the treaty governs the use of roughly 55 trillion gallons of water per year, which sustains more than 210 million people in the basin.
Today about 80 percent of Pakistan's cultivated lands are irrigated by water from the Indus system, the lion's share being governed by the IWT. Of the IWT water, more than 70 percent of flows from the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. Not only is Pakistan's population projected to increase by 82 percent, from 184 million in 2010 to 335 million in 2050; per capita water availability was already nearly 80 percent lower in 2005 than 1947, plunging from 5,600 cubic meters to 1,200 cubic meters. A growing alarm in Pakistan over this hydrological straitjacket has in recent years spurred jihadi leaders based there to frame their attacks against India as a struggle to secure the rivers that form Pakistan's "lifeline."
It is time to take another look at the successful experiment of the Indus Canal waters treaty and to build on its success.
The fact is that water is the hidden driver of South Asia's most dangerous territorial dispute of Kashmir. According to David Lilllienthal, " The struggle for Kashmir was motivated in large part by Pakistan's desperation to control the rivers that flowed through the region."
India and Pakistan signed the IWT in 1960, after protracted negotiations facilitated by the World Bank Before the partition of British India in 1947, each province had jurisdiction to build dams and other infrastructure for electricity and irrigation on the portions of the rivers that flowed through their land; after partition, a series of patchwork agreements left several key issues, such as whether and how much Pakistan should pay India for water and canal maintenance costs, unresolved. The IWT gave "unrestricted use" of the basin's thee western rivers (the Indus, the Jhelum, and the Chenab) to Pakistan and the three eastern rivers (the Ravi, the Beas, and the Sutlej) to India. Today, the treaty governs the use of roughly 55 trillion gallons of water per year, which sustains more than 210 million people in the basin.
Today about 80 percent of Pakistan's cultivated lands are irrigated by water from the Indus system, the lion's share being governed by the IWT. Of the IWT water, more than 70 percent of flows from the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. Not only is Pakistan's population projected to increase by 82 percent, from 184 million in 2010 to 335 million in 2050; per capita water availability was already nearly 80 percent lower in 2005 than 1947, plunging from 5,600 cubic meters to 1,200 cubic meters. A growing alarm in Pakistan over this hydrological straitjacket has in recent years spurred jihadi leaders based there to frame their attacks against India as a struggle to secure the rivers that form Pakistan's "lifeline."
It is time to take another look at the successful experiment of the Indus Canal waters treaty and to build on its success.
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