BAGLIHAR DAM AND FUTURE PROSPECT
Introduction
1. In the twenty first century many parts of the world are likely to witness their wars on water. Probably the tensions on water are nowhere as intense as they are in South Asia. The Baglihar project manifests how difficult it is to reconcile the mutually exclusive positions taken by the sides. The project is controversial in every single respect. Pakistan prefers a name, which conveys that it is being built to divert the water of River Chenab. The preferred Indian name is Baglihar Power Project, which is an attempt to make the people think that Baglihar has no purpose other than power generation. Such differences are accompanied by another important disagreement over the project’s design. Similarly, the dispute stems from a mutually exclusive reading of the Indus Basin water treaty and the World Bank’s role in dispute resolution. Baglihar Dam, however is an example of Indian intransigence and indifferent attitude towards needs of its smaller neighbour. It also highlights that how a powerful country can so easily opt to violate the international treaties.
2. The Baglihar controversy has its genesis in Indus Waters Treaty, which has worked well for the last forty five years. The treaty has survived mostly because it involves actors outside the region – the World Bank being the most important of them.
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3. The two sides under the treaty enjoy exclusive rights over the rivers flowing through the one to the other. Few Indians think that the treaty gave no consideration to the issue of future requirements that both the countries may have, as far as utilising common waters is concerned, power generation being only one of the most important of these usages. In another Indian view, the treaty failed to visualise, and consequently provide for, any water shortages to occur in the future.
4. These factors are at the heart of the current dispute over Baglihar project. The Indian attitude has heightened fears in Pakistan, that India being an upper riparian is trying to ‘gobble up’ more water than its share. There is a general perception in Pakistan that regardless of the debate whether the treaty was just or not, India wants to deny Pakistan of its rightful share of the Western Rivers given to it by the treaty. Additionally, India wants to use/regulate the waters of all these rivers and to starve Pakistan, as was threatened by an Indian minister by saying “if we decide to scrap Indus Waters Treaty, then there will be drought in that country.”[?]
5. Aim. To carry out an objective analysis of Baglihar Dam, its implications on Pakistan and recommend measures to counter its adverse effects.
6. Pakistan-Water Perspective. Pakistan has three main drainage basins namely Indus Basin, Kharan Closed Basin and Makran Coastal Basin. Out of these, Indus Basin occupies over 70% of the region[?]. Annual flow of water available in Indus River System is estimated to be 150 MAF but only 84.9 MAF reaches the farm gate, with the remaining lost due to different reasons. The ground water availability stands at 50 MAF making total availability of water to the tune of 134.9 MAF. Total estimated requirement of water in 2004 was 149.8 MAF out of which 143.3 MAF was required for irrigation system and 6.5 MAF for industrial and domestic use. Another 10 MAF was required for drainage to Arabian Sea in order to check environmental degradation. Hence, the total short fall came to 24.9 MAF, which would increase year by year[?]. The above situation will prevail as long as India respects Indus Waters Treaty and does not abrogate or violate it (which she has already started).
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Baglihar Dam – An Analysis
7. General. Under the provisions of Indus Water Treaty 1960, India informed Pakistan in 1992[?] about its plan to construct a hydro-electric power plant on River Chenab at Baglihar. The Baglihar project is a Run-of-River hydro electric plant with live pondage and initial designs stipulate storage capacity in excess of Indus Waters Treaty clauses. Work on Rs 38 Billion dam started in May 1999[?]. Pakistan has strong objections[?] to the dam’s design, its storage capacity etcetera but despite demands India has neither stopped the construction nor amended the design. Rather, India is reported to have completed 60% of construction work on power house while 35% work at the reservoir has also been completed[?].
12. Salient Features of the Project
a. Type – Concrete
b. Length – 1040 feet
c. Height – 144 m[?]
d. Storage capacity – 1,64,000
e. Pondage in Operating Pool – 38 Million Cubic Meters
f. Maximum Designed Discharge – 5,83,000 Cusecs
g. Tunnel Length – 2 Kilometers
h. Tunnel Diameter – 10 m
j. Electricity Generation – Initially 450 MW, later 900MW
k. Number of Spillways – 6
l. Completion Date – 2007[?], but could become operational by December
2005
13. Pakistan’s Objections. The Pakistani objections are:-
a. Dam’s Height. The present height of the dam at 470 feet is excessive and will create a reservoir in excess of power generation needs.
b. Water Blocking. The new reservoir could block the flow of the river for a period of 26-28[?] days during the low season (January-February), thus the project will make a drop of 7000 cubic feet per second per day in Pakistani water supply during the period. It would essentially result into 26-28 percent decrease in water supply to Pakistan in the winters, thus her Rabi crop will suffer.
c. Storage Capacity. The project would increase Indian storage capacity in Jammu and Kashmir to 1, 64,000 acre-feet, which is higher than the permissible levels.
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d. Gated Spillway. The authenticity of Indian claims that the site conditions make a gated spillway necessary[?].
e. Project Configuration. Pakistan desires that few changes in the design of the dam should be made to provide for low level intake and release of flood waters.
14. Indian Design/Intentions
a. To control the waters of all rivers flowing to Pakistan through its territory. The Baglihar Dam along with the Dul Hasti and Salal Dams can simply reduce the flow of River Chenab during the critical Rabi crop growing season (January-February).
b. To control the river flow to Pakistan with the aim of either stopping Pakistani water supply or flooding her during any war. This flood water stopping/flooding would cripple/destroy Pakistani defences including Upper and Lower Chenab Canals in Sialkot region and all the way to Panjnad in the south.
c. To use the water as her bargaining chip to cater for a contingency where Pakistan disrupts Indo – Iranian natural gas supplies through pipeline laid through Pakistan.
d. Achieve a revision of the Indus Waters Treaty by continuously claiming that it was imbalanced and too mathematical. Also claiming that Indian interest had not been well protected by the treaty and its population in Kashmir/elsewhere was unnecessarily suffering due to its clauses.
e. Launching an international campaign to convince world community that Pakistan was unable to use all the water given to it by the treaty and was annually throwing 38 MAF water in the sea[?].
f. Alienating the Kashmiris from Pakistan by projecting Pakistan as a state working against their interests by opposing construction of this population friendly dam.
g. Cause loss to Pakistani economy and agriculture by reducing water supplies to the country.
h. By providing less water to its lower riparian neighbour, provide and impetus to already existing inter-provincial disputes and suspicions in that country.
j. Most importanly, try to find out a way to develop an infrastructure for taking the Indus Basin Waters to Indian lands in south[?].
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15. Measures for Conflict Resolution
a. India claims that Pakistan was informed in 1992 about the planned building of the dam and she wasted all the time. Pakistan says that complete information was not provided to her by India, so time between 1992 and 2000 was wasted in correspondence between the Indus Water Commissioners. However, Pakistan offered talks to resolve the issue.
b. After the objection surfaced, officers from both the countries met, but the talks remained inconclusive.
c. After failure of the talks, Pakistan served another notice to India to meet three cnditions:-
(1) Stop work on the project.
(2) Agree to on-site inspection by the Pakistani Indus Waters Commission.
(3) Resolve the dispute by 30 September 2003, failing which it reserved the right to approach the World Bank for the appointment of a neutral expert[?]
d. However, Pakistan continued with the efforts to resolve the issue with India at bi-lateral level. In October 2003 a three member technical experts team, led by Pakistani Commissioner for Indus Waters visited India. The team found out that the dam was being constructed in violation of 1960 treaty and brought solid points for strengthening Pakistan’s case[?].
e. After failure of Foreign Secretary level talks (4-6 January 2005) held in Islamabad, Pakistan requested the World Bank on 18 January 2005 to appoint a neutral expert.
f. Swiss professor Raymond Lafitte has been appointed the neutral expert, the expert visited site in October 05[?] and gave a technical proforma to both sides for filling, to be returned by 31 December 2005. Pakistan has failed in submitting answers to technical questions following delay in provision of certain data by India. Therefore, the neutral expert has extended deadline to 31 January 2006[?].
16. Implications for Pakistan. The construction of Baglihar Dam alone and in conjunction with other dams is anticipated to have effects on various segments of Pakistani society. Some of the implications are as under:-
a. Agricultural Implications
(1) Indian water stopping capability on River Chenab will increase from 12 days to 38 days[?]. This water, if stopped in water deficient months of January-February will have serious effects on the provision of sufficient water supply for Rabi crop.
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(2) The construction of the dam provides India with ample opportunities to resort to flooding of Pakistan in monsoon / heavy rain months. Pakistani water holding infrastructure may not be able to efficiently manage a sudden arrival of heavy water flow, thus the fields and crops may suffer heavy losses.
(3) Agriculture in Punjab is mostly dependent upon the water of River Chenab. Most of the Chenab canals off take from Marala Head works.[?] The water carried by these canals ultimately irrigates some portion of Southern Punjab too. Pakpattan, Depalpur, Fordwah and Bahawal Canals are fed through waters of Rivers Chenab and Jhelum. In case of less water availability in River Chenab, the crops being irrigated by these canals will obviously be seriously affected.
(4) The subsoil water is generally recharged by rain and seepage of river/canal water. In case of less rainfall and scarcity of water in rivers and canals, the sub soil water level drops and tube wells get dry. Additionally, the pumped sub soil water is generally brackish, brings more salts to the surface and reduces soil fertility.
b. Operational Implications
(1) The submerged gated spillway of the Baglihar Dam and other structures will substantially increase the Indian storage capacity. On completion of the dam, the total denial capacity of Chenab waters will be increased to 38 days, thus only the seepage water i.e. 1700 cusecs[?] will come to Marala in the Chenab. It will have following implications:-
(a) Facilitate India in undertaking any operation across River Chenab without a major engineer effort.
(b) By sudden release of the stored water, India can interfere with Pakistani bridging effort.
(2) Pakistan has constructed a number of border area canals for defence of the country. The reduced supply of water will affect the water availability and the obstacle value of these canals. The canals likely to be affected are[?]:-
(a) Marala – Ravi Link Canal off taking from Marala Head works.
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(b) Bambanwala – Ravi – Bedian – Dipalpur Link off taking from Upper Chenab Canal at Bambanwala Head Regulator.
(c) Upper Depalpur Canal off taking from tail Bambanwala – Ravi Bedian – Dipalpur Link near Ferozepur Head Works.
(d) Eastern Sadiqia Canal off taking from Sulemanki Headworks on River Sutlej.
(3) The border area canals are required to be run at Full Supply Levels. In case of emergency they are maintained at Emergency Supply Level i.e one foot lower than Full Supply Level. A minimum depth of 5 feet is to be maintained in all border area channels while minimum depth of 4-6 feet is required to be maintained in Fordwah Canal to keep them as effective obstacles. With reduced water supply the obstacle value of these canals will definitely be reduced[?].
(4) The storage capacity also provides India an ability to create further aggravated flood conditions downstream of Marala. Floods can generate following effects:-
(a) Inundate Pukhlian Salient and create flood conditions with 4,00,000 cusecs of water, thus preventing its use as a jump off point by Pakistan[?].
(b) Back flow in Jammu Tawi due to excessive water at Marala. It will not only make Tawi crossing difficult but also create physiological effect of Pukhlian’s isolation.
(5) Release of maximum discharge will disrupt Engineer bridges downstream of Marala Head Works, intended for entry/exit in the corridor.
(6) Marala Head Works, being a socio-economic and strategic asset may also be damaged due to sudden gush of huge additional water.
(7) Water from Ranbir canal can be released into old bed of River Chenab/Ghag Nullah through feeders/outlets using inter connected Ditch cum Bunds. The flooding caused can affect the front line defences[?]. Defences in 4 corps area and South of Sutlej will also be seriously affected, if Chenab waters are controlled / regulated by India.
c. Miscellaneous Implications
(1) Opposition to Dam Construction. Due to opposition from certain federating units no new dam has been constructed after Tarbela. The opposition to dams is primarily due to the provincial fears that their water shares will be reduced after dams construction[?]. After construction of Baglihar the supply of water to Pakistan will further reduce and opposition to big dams like Kalabagh may gain further strength.
(2) Indian Attempts at Revision of Indus Water Treaty India has already started efforts in the direction by claiming that Pakistan is wasting river waters by letting about 38 MAF flow into the sea annually, whereas India is short of water. Thus, the Indus Water Treaty be revised to provide more water to India for preventing its wastage.
(3) Inter-Provisional Disharmony. All provinces are suffering from the ill-effects of river water shortage. Sindh province, being heavily dependent on river water for its agricultural and other needs is specially vocal in expressing its sentiments on the issue, Sindh’s complaints are likely to get even stronger when after construction of Baglihar its water share is further reduced. The Sindhi politicians are already blaming the Punjab of being indifferent to its needs, this all is contributing towards weakening the brotherly bonds between the provinces. Few of Sindh’s fears are as under:-
(a) Katcho Area Devastation. About 2 million acres along River Indus is inundated with flood waters. This area includes 5,00,000 acres[?] of sailaba agricultural lands and 6,00,000 acres of reverine forests. In case of reduced water supply in the Indus, both the area and people will face adverse effects.
(b) Mangrove Forest Destruction. The forest forms an important part of the ecosystem and is a source of timber, fuel wood and fodder. The forest acts as windbreaker and prevents storms from making to the inland. If water is not allowed in sufficient quantity below Kotri Barrage, 2,94,000 acres of mangrove forest will be affected.[?]
(c) Salt Water Intrusion. The Indus water discharge to the sea keeps the sea water away from and does not let it intrude too much in the land. With the dropping flow of river water in the sea, it is moving inland and has already engulfed large chunks of fertile lands. In case the river water flow is reduced any further, sea intrusion will increase further.[?]
(4) Migration to Cities. The rural population of the country is enerally a labour force employed on agriculture related jobs. Such jobs are likely to reduce with less water availability. These people are then expected to migrate to cities to earn a living and in the process cause additional burden to already over populated cities.
(5) Dropping of Water Level. Tube wells have been sunk in large numbers to irrigate the crops. Because of reduced river flows the fresh water tubewells dependent on river water seepage will be affected and may become saline[?].
Recommendations and Conclusion
17. General. Pakistan needs to be very careful in dealing with the water related issues. The country’s response should be carefully calculated and precisely measured because any faulty decision will have far reaching consequences for the nation and its economy. Following recommendations are therefore offered for tackling the Baglihar Dam issue in particular and the effects of the water scarcity in general : –
a. Revision of Indus Waters Treaty
(1) India is desirous of revising the treaty, has worked persistently for the purpose and apparently has been building up her case for many years. Only recently Indian writers started expressing views frequently that Pakistan is incapable of storing water granted to it by the treaty. They claim that due to Pakistan’s inability to tap this resource, precious water is flowing to the sea, while India which has the ability to harness it, is being prevented by the treaty from doing so. Thus, treaty should be revised.
(2) Pakistani experts believe that any revision of the treaty would open a Pandora box, Pakistani Government is therefore urged to clearly read the Indian intentions and understand the negative after effects of revision of this treaty. Foregoing in view it is recommended that Pakistan should never subscribe to Indian idea of treaty revision.
b. National Consensus. The Pakistani Government by clearing suspicions of the smaller provinces should try to achieve a quick consensus for construction of big dams like Kalabagh. Some visible steps are recommended to be taken by the government to resolve the contentious issues like dam royalty etcetera. A formula is therefore suggested to be worked out for distributing the royalty of proposed big dams like Kalabagh among the provinces.
c. Media Campaign. Effective media campaign is recommended to be be launched to educate the masses about the consequences of water shortages on agriculture, industry and electricity generation. The general public should be excessively informed of the likely economic crunch and agricultural shortfalls, if no new dams are constructed. It should also be highlighted that it is not in interest of certain countries and groups of people to let the dam be constructed and for this reason disinformation is being spread among the people.
d. Neutral Arbitration. Pakistan has made sustained efforts to solve its water issue with India at bi-lateral level. India however appears non-serious on conflict resolution and has continued violating the clauses of Indus Waters Treaty. Pakistan should therefore raise all of its Indus Waters Treaty related issues at intentional forums and seek neutral expert’s decisions. Reportedly, Pakistan is launching request for appointing a neutral expert for Kishanganga case also. Following this news, India being highly sensitive to raising of any Kashmir related issue at international level, may try to settle the issue at bilateral level. However, incase it does not happen, the neutral expert services are recommended to be acquired.
e. Construction of River Link Canals. The headworks at Marala is presently being used to feed the Pakistani defence canals. With the drop in water supply at Marala, the availability of water in these canals will also reduce. To recope the lost Chenab waters, a new canal is recommended to be constructed from Mangla to Marala. Through this canal Jhelum’s waters may be brought to Chenab. However, it is suggested that Sindh province should be taken in confidence before starting construction of the canal, as Jhelum waters are ultimately used by that province.
f. Exterior Manoeuver. In addition to approaching the World Bank for appointing the neutral expert, Pakistan must launch determined diplomatic campaign in important capitals of the world. If needed, lobbies may be hired to sell Pakistani case and apprise the key government functionaries / political leaders about the ground realities and Indian indifferent attitude towards the internationally respected treaties.
g. Drip Irrigation. The current irrigation techniques of the country are outdated and lot of water is wasted in irrigating the fields. It is therefore recommended that latest irrigation methods like drip irrigation may be introduced in the country and the farmers be encouraged to use such modern techniques.
h. Power Generation from Alternate Sources. Different sources like nuclear energy, solar energy, coal and oil are being used globally for power generation. As Pakistan can not afford to build big dams for the time being, therefore Government is recommended to make determined efforts to acquire electricity generation means in following order of priority:
(1) Nuclear
(2) Solar
(3) Thermal
j. Desilting of Dams. Silt is the most serious problem for the irrigation engineers[?]. Silt has considerably reduced the storage capacity of Pakistani dams. Probably the effects of water lost to India through construction of Baglihar Dam can be minimised by restoring the original storage capacity of Mangla and Tarbela Dams. Therefore, these dams are suggested to be desilted to revive their original storage capacity.
k. Monitoring of Indian Activities. A mechanism for carrying out an effective monitoring of all water related activities in Indian Held Kashmir is recommended to be evolved and strictly implemented. Even the smallest violation of the water treaty must be immediately picked up and brought to the notice of international community.
l. Construction of Small Dams. The political sensitivities do not allow construction of big dams but there is no bar on construction of small dams. It is therefore recommended that a large number of small dams be constructed throughout the country to store the rain and stream water.
18. Conclusion. Water is a very important commodity and its importance is continuously increasing. India definitely realises its importance and is not showing any intention of losing its control over Pakistani water supplies, thus she is determined to go ahead with the construction of Baglihar Dam. Pakistan being located in an arid zone needs secure river water supplies and is making all out efforts to attain its objectives. Pakistan, in its own interests should continue with her efforts and must not allow India to carry the day. Because, if India succeeds in her designs of stealing Pakistani waters then it will be too difficult for Pakistan to survive as a viable sovereign state.
