Addressing an election rally in Haryana, Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed that India will not allow its river water to flow to Pakistan.

“For 70 years, the water that belongs to India and the farmers of Haryana flowed to Pakistan. Modi will stop this water (from flowing into Pakistan) and bring to your houses,” Modi said on October 16.

The Indus Water Treaty has been a key issue on several occasions, especially during rising conflicts between India and Pakistan.

Following the Pulwama attack in February, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari announced that India has decided to block the flow of its share of water from the Indus river to Pakistan.

Earlier, after the Uri attack in 2016, the Centre had said that India will review the Indus Waters Treaty. Eventually, the Centre decided to speed up the water projects to arrest the unutilised water and the projects include Shahpur Kandi dam, Sutlej-Beas link in Punjab and Ujh Dam in Jammu and Kashmir.

Background

India and Pakistan share the waters of six rivers - Ravi, Beas, Sutlej, Indus, Chenab and Jhelum. The basin is mainly shared by India and Pakistan with a small share for China and Afghanistan.

Under the Indus Waters Treaty signed between India and Pakistan in 1960,  the water from the three eastern rivers - Ravi, Sutlej and Beas - averaging around 33 million acre feet (MAF) were allocated to India for exclusive use.

The water from western rivers - Indus, Jhelum and Chenab - averaging to around 135 MAF were allocated to Pakistan except for specified domestic, non-consumptive and agricultural use permitted to India as provided in the treaty.

India has also been given the right to generate hydroelectricity through run of the river (RoR) projects on the western rivers which, subject to specific criteria for design and operation is unrestricted.

To utilise the waters of the eastern rivers, India has constructed Bhakra Dam on Satlej, Pong and Pandoh Dam on Beas and Thein (Ranjitsagar) on Ravi. These storage works, together with other works like Beas-Sutlej Link, Madhopur-Beas Link, Indira Gandhi Nahar Project has helped India utilise nearly the entire share (95 per cent) of waters of the eastern rivers.

However, about 2 MAF of water annually from Ravi is reported to be still flowing unutilised to Pakistan below Madhopur. To stop the flow of these waters, following steps have been taken…

1. Resumption of construction of Shahpurkandi project: It will help in utilising the waters coming out from powerhouse of Thein dam to irrigate 37,000 hectares in J&K and Punjab and generate 206 MW of power.

2. Construction of Ujh multipurpose project: It will create a storage of about 781 million cubic metres of water on Ujh, a tributary of Ravi for irrigation and power generation in India and provide plenty of irrigation benefits.

3. The second Ravi Beas link below Ujh: It is being planned to tap excess water flowing down to Pakistan through Ravi, even after the construction of Thein Dam, by constructing a barrage across the Ravi for diverting water through a tunnel link to the Beas basin.