Whether an Indian ruling party MP's allegation of harming his country's farmers for sharing of waters of common rivers with Bangladesh reflects the tacit position of New Delhi is a matter that should be dealt with by the office bearers of Bangladesh's water resources and foreign affairs ministries.
However, the way the Lok Sabha member of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Nishikant Dubey has publicly raised the issue indicates India's hegemonic mindset and attitude towards Bangladesh by denying the lower riparian country its right to receive waters in accordance with natural, uninterrupted flow of rivers.
His repeated note of interrogation in an assertive sentence -- “the water goes to Bangladesh?” -- posted recently on X suggests his regret as if the flow of transboundary rivers is undue, unfair, or unnatural.
Criticizing his country's past Congress governments for striking deals to share waters of mainly two rivers, the Indian lawmaker claimed that the “river waters were shared with Bangladesh at the expense of India’s own needs.” This claim contradicts the hard fact: Over the decades, India has unilaterally withdrawn waters of all cross-border rivers except the Ganges, covered by a 1996 treaty.
There is no deal on sharing waters of another major river, the Teesta, since the expiry of an ad hoc arrangement in 1987. The number of rivers that come from or through India to Bangladesh is 54, transboundary rivers for which a bilateral working group called Joint Rivers Commission was formed in 1972 to handle water-sharing and other relevant issues.
Still, according to available data, India has constructed more than 30 dams and barrages at different upstream points of international rivers obstructing their flow into Bangladesh. This forceful change in watercourses goes against the principles of international laws.
Such acts, carried out by India, have harmed Bangladesh -- its ecology and farming ecosystem.
Now, whenever there is hilly onrush of water or India releases excess waters by opening gates of dams and barrages during the monsoon to avert flooding, Bangladesh faces flash floods that cause higher losses. The 2024 late floods damaged standing crops in major parts of Bangladesh and in May this year, farmers of haor (marshy) region lost Boro rice days before harvesting due to unexpected flooding.
The country’s navigable inland waterways have come down from around 24,000 kilometres to less than 4,000 km since the 1970s. With loss of currents of rivers, salinity intrusion into coastal areas has increased much before the widely-anticipated sea-level rise under the impact of climate change, threatening agriculture, environment, and public health.
Some of the national achievements such as near self-sufficiency in foodgrain production cannot be rejoiced due to environmental costs associated with irrigation by means of extraction of ground water. The main grain production season -- of Aman rice grown in floodplains -- has been substituted by dry season production -- of Boro rice which is cultivated mostly on the land earlier used for diverse Robi crops.
Coinciding with widening areas of Boro rice cultivation replacing traditional crops, the country has been increasingly dependent on imports of, say, oil seeds and pulses although the Ganges-Brahmaputra basin produces the best quality mustard oil seed and the tastiest pulses. Also blessed with varieties of open, sweet water fishes, Bangladesh now has to produce three fourths of almost five million tons of fish in artificial water bodies.
Excessive extraction of ground water for irrigation and inadequate recharging due to lack of inundation of floodplains has led to fall of ground water level in the north-western region and central part of the country at an alarming rate of 1-3 metres a year.
Had there been no withdrawal of river waters upstream beyond the border, Bangladesh would have escaped the aforementioned losses and long-term damage to its ecology. Therefore, New Delhi has no scope to dismiss the fact that Bangladesh has been harmed by declining flow of transboundary rivers.
The "no-harm principle" of the United Nations Watercourses Convention 1997 restricts construction of dams or diversions that inflict damage to the downstream. Article 7 of the Convention states: "Watercourse States shall, in utilizing an international watercourse in their territories, take all appropriate measures to prevent the causing of significant harm to other watercourse States."
India's foreign policy priority to avoid multilateralism is self-contradictory since it has been involved in more than 100 major international organizations, treaties, and multilateral groupings. Bangladesh is also part of the global system and not any rogue state like Israel.
However, a water expert told this author, officials of Bangladesh's Ministry of Water Resources and a section of diplomats and politicians have all along maintained a certain hush-hush policy about claiming fair share of waters through proper bargaining bilaterally and have shown reluctance to using international rules in arguments.
Using the excuse of bilateralism or resistance from domestic stakeholders, India has managed to refrain from signing any formal agreement on sharing waters of major rivers except one (Padma/Ganges) by exerting hegemonic influence. The 30-year Ganges Water-sharing Treaty signed in 1996, too, is set to expire this year.
In that context, the BJP MP's statement, explicitly hostile to sharing river waters with Bangladesh, may be aimed at undermining Dhaka's position in future water-sharing talks.
It is now incumbent upon the new government of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party to reach an agreement with India, upholding and protecting the national interests in the light of universal principles.
Khawaza Main Uddin is a journalist. Views expressed are the writer's own.