The World Bank hosted the two-day long secretary-level talks between India and Pakistan on the technical issues of the Indus Waters Treaty talks during July31-August 1. The discussions took place at Washington ‘in a spirit of goodwill and cooperation,’ said a brief statement issued after the talks. ‘The parties have agreed to continue discussions and reconvene in September in Washington,’ the bank added. The bank also released a brief description of the dispute and of its efforts to resolve it, along with a short background of the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT).

Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) was signed in 1960 between India and Pakistan under the aegis of World Bank which stands as the guarantor. The treaty, unarguably the most liberal water treaty in the world to date, came to focus in recent years when, tormented by terror state Pakistan, Indian Prime Minister Modi talked of Indian resolve to utilise its rightful share of twenty per cent of the waters of western rivers India is entitled to under the treaty. India hardly uses 2-3 per cent at present.

Towards that end, India has been expediting the construction of the Kishenganga (330MW) and Ratle (850MW) hydroelectric power plants on a tributary of the Jhelum and the Chenab rivers respectively despite disagreements between the two countries over the technical design features of the two plants. While Pakistan vehemently opposes dam construction and blames India for contravening the provisions of the treaty India maintains that the design is in consonance with the treaty provisions.

Pakistan has asked the World Bank to facilitate the setting up of a court of arbitration to look into the designs of the two plants India rightly argued for the appointment of a neutral expert since differences pertained to design specifications only. Following the requests, a series of bilateral talks were held at New Delhi, Islamabad and Washington but have so far failed to resolve the dispute. The recent meeting in Washington was a part of that process.

The Bank sought to fulfil its procedural obligations with respect to both the court of arbitration and the neutral expert but the treaty does not empower the World Bank to choose whether one procedure should take precedence over the other.

The treaty vests the determination of jurisdictional competence on each of the two mechanisms. ‘At the same time, the World Bank actively encouraged both countries to agree amicably on a mechanism to address the issues,’ and clarified further that it was not financing the disputed projects.

The bank also released a brief description of its efforts to resolve the water dispute. On December 12, 2016, World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim announced that the bank would pause before taking further steps in each of the two processes requested by the parties. Since then it had worked towards an amicable resolution of the matter and to safeguard the treaty. Kim spoke several times with the finance ministers of both countries.

World Bank Chief Executive Officer Kristalina Georgieva travelled to both countries for high-level meetings. The World Bank Vice President for the South Asia Region, Annette Dixon, visited both countries twice. Kim’s adviser, Ian Solomon, also made multiple visits to the region. The locally-based World Bank teams had convened dozens of meetings with different stakeholders wherein ‘a variety of proposals have been discussed.’

The World Bank clarified that the treaty “designates these two rivers as well as the Indus as the western rivers to which Pakistan has unrestricted use” but also pointed out that India is permitted to construct hydroelectric power facilities on these rivers subject to constraints specified in the annexure to the treaty. This is clearly a victory for India, a really big victory. This round has gone in India’s favour which is entitled to rightful use of its share of water.

Pakistan’s objections have been overruled as it failed to provide proofs to the World Bank that it was the first among the two countries to have approved a dam. In addition, the World Bank asked both India and Pakistan to solve this issue bilaterally with no future role for World Bank in this matter.

Pakistan and India reportedly displayed goodwill and cooperation in the latest round of talks on the water dispute and have agreed to meet again for the next round of talks to be held at the World Bank’s headquarters in Washington during September.

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