By Aamir Latif and Zahid Rafiq
KARACHI, Pakistan (AA) - The Indus Water Treaty (IWT) -- a key water sharing agreement between Pakistan and India -- has become a new focus of lingering tension between the two nuclear-armed neighbors since a brazen militant attack on an Indian army camp in disputed Kashmir valley last month.
Reports of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi considering scrapping a decades-long water sharing treaty has led to Pakistan warning that such a step would equate to a declaration of war -- a threat analysts downplay though.
According to the agreement, which was brokered by the World Bank in 1960, the waters of the eastern rivers -- the Sutlej, Beas and Ravi -- have been allocated to India, while the three western rivers -- the Indus, Jhelum and Chenab -- to Pakistan.
The much-needed treat was the result of an international intervention following heightened tension between the two arch rivals over water sharing that had begun soon after the partition of united India in 1947.
Initially, the two countries had signed a three-month water sharing “standstill agreement” in 1947, however, the issue remained a flashpoint between the two neighbors till signing of IWT in1960 following successful negotiations between the two governments brokered by the World Bank.
The agreement, which many Pakistani water experts see as pro-India, allows India a limited use of water from the three eastern rives, including storage of 2.85 million acre feet water, in addition to full control over the three western rivers.
According to the IWT, Pakistan gets 131 million acre feet water annually, which provides almost 70 per cent Pakistan’s needs for irrigation. India, on the other hand, gets 26 million acre feet water from the three western rivers, which cope up less than 10 per cent of India’s irrigation needs.
India has also been locked in a water tussle with China, which plans to construct of dams and proposed diversion of the Brahmaputra River, which originates in Tibet and provides a third of India’s needs for irrigation.
INDIA NOT CAPABLE OF BLOCKING PAKISTAN’S WATER
Despite New Delhi’s threat to suspend the IWT, water experts do not see India as capable of doing that- legally or technically.
“This (threat) can serve as a political slogan for an irate India but it is not capable of doing that because of several legal and technical handicaps”, Jamat Ali Shah, a Pakistan’s former water commissioner told The Anadolu Agency.
In additional to international pressure in case of a unilateral scrapping of the agreement, he observed, India did not have the capacity to store such a huge quantity of water.
“It will take India years if it starts construction of dams and mega hydropower projects today to stop Pakistan’s water”, Shah, who served as Pakistan’s water commissioner from 1993 to 2010 said.
Rabia Sultan, a Lahore-based water expert shares the same views.
“India’s threat is just for public consumption. International riparian laws are not easy to violate as they survive even wars”, Rabia told the Anadolu Agency referring to 1965 and 1971 wars between Pakistan and India , which did not affect the IWT.
“India will not go that far as a unilateral scrapping would be a major thing to do, and the international community, especially big powers would not endorse that”, she opined adding that under international laws , a country which is denied water that is central to its existence, can go to war.
Shakil Romshoo, head of the earth sciences department at the University of Indian-held Kashmir observes that New Delhi can only make noises about abrogating the IWT.
“There are two things we are talking about. A legal way to abrogate the IWT and illegal one. Legally, the agreement cannot be abrogated by one party, no matter what. To abrogate the IWT, India would have to go to World Bank that will appoint a bench of judges and look into the matter”, he told the Anadolu Agency.
Since the reason for calls for abrogation of the treaty are not about water sharing but about war hysteria, World Bank would never agree, Romshoo opined.
“Then remains stopping the water to Pakistan without approaching the World Bank: that is illegal. And it is impossible to do because India does not have the infrastructure to do it and when India decides to do such a thing, it would simultaneously mean the drowning of huge parts of the (Indian held) Kashmir”.
It will be a disaster for us in Kashmir." he maintained.
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