ABSTRACT
As emerging economies, both India and China have entered a phase of ‘perennial water scarcity’ where industrial outfits, irrigation pattern, agricultural sector and people’s livelihood demand more water resources.1 Exploitation of transboundary water resources, however, can cause serious conflict when an upper riparian country overlooks the needs and concerns of trans-national economies. The growing discord between India and China on the trans-boundary water resources is both a bilateral and trans-national problem. China has the edge in water politics, being an upper riparian state. Although India is both an upper and lower riparian country in regard to various rivers, most of the extended rivers flowing from the Himalayan region and Tibetan glacier make it largely a lower riparian state. The Ganga-Brahmaputra-Meghna/Barak (GBM) basin involves India, Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) of China, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan and extends up to 1.7 million km roughly (fao.org 2011; see also india-wris. nrsc.gov.in n.d.; Rasul 2015). Importantly, the Ganges and Brahmaputra headwaters originate from the Tibetan plateau, which is a Greater Himalayan mountain range. The Ganges headwaters flow south-west, and after entering India turn south-east to join major tributaries. After entering Bangladesh, they join the Brahmaputra and the Meghna to flow inside the Bay of Bengal. The Brahmaputra originates near Kailash Mansarovar in Tibet, flows east from the headwaters, and moves through the southern areas of TAR. It then enters eastern India, turns south-west and enters Bangladesh before merging with the Ganges. The Greater GBM basin amalgamates and compounds many socio-economic facets and environmental problems and concerns. The populace of the region is multireligious, multi-ethnic and mostly poor. Frequent floods, poor drainage and lack of water management system characterise the ecology of this water basin (fao. org 2011; Rasul 2015). For India, though the river waters originating from the Tibetan plateau are a great resource for its agricultural economy and renewable water supplies, they also pose a serious problem in managing the flow of the waters. The Brahmaputra/Yarlung Tsangpo, whose water is a matter of discord between India and China, originates from the Tibetan glacier, enters into Arunachal Pradesh and Assam in India and flows to Bangladesh. It takes a bend
on the India-China border, known as the Great Bend, and rushes between the Namcha Barwa and Gyala Pelri mountains (IDSA Task Force Report 2010: 45). China has an ambitious water diversion project in the Tibetan plateau, from south-western China to the dry lands of northern China, popularly known as the Grand Western Water Diversion Plan. This plan facilitates the South-North Water Diversion Project (SNWDP) (CCTV English 2011; chinadaily.com.cn 2015). SNWDP is one of Beijing’s largest infrastructure projects since the Three Gorges Dam. Mao Zedong conceived this project in 1952. It was formally approved in December 2002 after intense debate (Deng Shasha 2012). Guo Kai, a famous water expert, proposed this ‘Grand Western Water Diversion Plan’. The SNWDP became operational in 2014. The project consists of three routes – eastern, middle and western. India has a problem with the western route, which is connected through the Brahmaputra. If China decides to divert water from the Brahmaputra, the water flow is likely to be affected substantially, making most of north-eastern India drought prone. Currently, India has a data sharing MoU with China. The Chinese have been adamant about not entering into a dialogue with India on this issue (He Shan 2012). A range of Chinese media and government reports have indicated that China is serious about pushing the hydropower projects in the Brahmaputra’s Great Bend. The State Council of China in 2006 indicated planning of Yarlung Tsangpo water diversion projects after the near completion of the Three Gorges Dam (gov.cn 2006). Non-Chinese experts foresaw a nuclear detonation being linked to this programme (Christopher 2013: 15). Even though China ratified the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) in the 1990s, the interest in a nuclear detonation in water diversion was still kept alive, and Beijing persistently argued for a Peaceful Nuclear Explosion (PNE), where the clandestine aim was to use nuclear detonations for such a challenging water diversion programme (ibid.). Beijing’s five-year energy plan, released in January 2013, mentioned three dam-building projects in the Yarlung Tsangpo basin. When India expressed its concern about the possible adverse fallout on India of these plans, China assured India that these projects did not have a direct concern for India since the initial dam construction in Zangmu in Tibet was a run-of-the-river project (Parsai 2013). To India’s concern, however, hydrologists in China, for example Wang Guangqian, have been reported expressing the view that ‘even though we thought that the western route construction may not be possible for 50 years, it is necessary now’ (Xuyang Jingjing 2011). According to Chinese reports, SNWDP is expected to divert an estimated 44.8 billion cubic metres of water every year to almost ten provinces and cities (Yang Yi 2014a). According to these reports, ‘the western route of the SNWDP will flow from three tributaries of Yangtze River near the Bayankala Mountain’ (Yang Yi 2014b). The prime Indian concern about this matter has been that North-East India, which is heavily dependent on the Brahmaputra water for agricultural needs, may have substantial water shortage if China continues to divert water in the western bend of Yarlung Tsangpo/Brahmaputra; and if the water overflows, that
may cause floods. The initial Indian concern arose in 2000 when India’s northeast was flooded due to a dam burst in Tibet. Indian officials and experts presumed a Chinese hand behind this calamity and urged the Chinese government to compensate for it (BBC World 2000; Gogoi 2000). It turned out later that the flood occurred due to a natural dam burst. Nevertheless, India’s concern over China’s water diversion plan was validated when China in its National Defence White Paper, released in 2006, mentioned about the possibility and potentiality of the SNWDP (fas.org 2006).
