The communication to Pakistan also highlighted “significantly altered population demographics, the need to accelerate the development of clean energy, and other changes” as reasons necessitating a re-assessment of the treaty’s obligations.To give effect to the decision, the government has also formally issued a notification to suspend the Indus Water Treaty.The treaty brokered by the World Bank has governed the distribution and use of the Indus river and its tributaries between India and Pakistan since 1960.The Indus river system comprises the main river, the Indus, and its tributaries.The Ravi, Beas, Sutlej, Jhelum and Chenab are its left-bank tributaries, while the Kabul river, a right-bank tributary, does not flow through Indian territory.The Ravi, Beas and Sutlej are collectively referred to as the eastern rivers, while the Indus, Jhelum and Chenab are known as the western rivers.The water of this river system are crucial to both India and Pakistan.At the time of Independence, the boundary demarcation between the two newly-formed nations – India and Pakistan – cut through the Indus Basin, leaving India as the upper riparian and Pakistan as the lower riparian state.Two key irrigation works – one at Madhopur on the Ravi and another at Ferozepur on the Sutlej – on which Punjab on Pakistan’s side was entirely dependent, ended up within the Indian territory.This led to a dispute between the two countries over the utilisation of irrigation water from the existing infrastructure.
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