Clash looms between India and Pakistan over water resources

NEW DELHI: India will accelerate its building of new hydropower plants along three rivers that flow into Pakistan, a source familiar with the plan said. The move is likely to aggravate already tense relations with its neighbour a week after an attack on an Indian army base.

Disagreements over how to share the water of the Indus and other rivers have dogged relations between the nuclear-armed arch-rivals since independence in 1947.

The dispute looks set to be reignited after Prime Minister Narendra Modi told officials India should use more of the rivers’ resources. This came a week after the September 18 attack on an army base in the disputed region of Kashmir that New Delhi blames on Pakistan, a source said.

India has long accused Pakistan of backing militant groups operating in the Himalayan state of Jammu and Kashmir, through which several of the countries’ shared rivers flow. Pakistan denies the allegations. Modi and officials have discussed ways to increase exploitation of the Chenab, Jhelum and Indus rivers but said they would not violate a long-standing water treaty between the countries. “We want to exploit all our rights under the (Indus Water) treaty,” the source said. The Indus Water Treaty was signed in 1960 to resolve disputes, but India’s irrigation plans and construction of thousands of upstream dams has continued to annoy Pakistan, which depends on snow-fed Himalayan rivers for everything from drinking water to agriculture.