#dnaEdit: Brahmaputra tangle

The Chinese foreign office spokeswoman Hua Chunying has clarified that the hydro-electric dams being built on the Yarlung Zangbo river in Tibet, which becomes the Brahmaputra in India and Bangladesh, will not cause trouble in the lower reaches of the river. She has also said that China is sharing flood season hydrological data with India. The Chinese clarification is unlikely to soothe all the misgivings on the Indian side. It would be better if there is an official statement from the Indian side as well, confirming or denying the information provided by Hua. 

There are quite a few scaremongers, who belong to the strategic community as well as to the vanguard of ecological activists, on the Indian side. They have been warning for some years now about the negative impact of Chinese hydro-electric projects on Yarlung Zangbo in Tibet, in Assam and other parts of the North-east. Unfortunately, the Indian apprehensions are expressed in general terms and there is no specific data to back the claims. The absence of information on the crucial issue is understandable because governments are chary of sharing data. Some of it may be related to sensitive security questions, but authorities on both sides should try to make public as much information as possible. This will help greatly in clearing the air.

Experts point out that there is no river water-sharing treaty between India and China as there is one between India and Pakistan in the form of the Indus Water Treaty. There are several reasons for this. The Indus and its tributaries flow through legally demarcated areas of India and Pakistan. And apart from Jammu and Kashmir, there is no border dispute with Pakistan. In the case of China, India had acknowledged that Tibet is part of China. The problem arose with the boundary between the two countries, and it remains unresolved. The two sides have been engaged in border talks at the delegation levels and 17 rounds have been completed. The border dispute, which has clear security implications, casts a shadow on the Chinese construction of dams on Yarlung Zangbo in Tibet.

The existence of a Brahmaputra treaty on the lines of the Indus Water Treaty would make things easy. For example, Pakistan had ecological objections to India building the Kishenganga hydro-electric dam in Kashmir. The matter has been referred to the international court of arbitration in The Hague. The court has conceded that India has a right to build the dam and divert the waters, but it has laid down conditions about the sharing of information. But it would appear that India and China are in the process of working an informal arrangement of sharing information with each other.

What is missing is the trust factor. Non-governmental and putative independent experts in the two countries present belligerent scenarios of the security relations between the two countries. Indian experts perceive a clear security threat from China, while the Chinese experts see India as part of a United States-led Asia-Pacific alliance to contain China. The irony is that India-China economic ties are stronger than ever and they are poised for exponential growth. China has a similar ambivalent parallel with Japan. The economic relations are brisk and positive but diplomatic temperatures are higher than ever. It has to be seen as Asia’s historical baggage and perhaps this will remain the model for some more time. It will be better then if India’s China-baiters are not allowed to drown out the positive economic notes.