Indus Waters Treaty one of strategic blunders by Nehru, alleges Assam CM Himanta

Guwahati: Alleging that the signing of the Indus Waters Treaty by former PM Jawaharlal Nehru was "one of the greatest strategic blunders", Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma said the suspension of the pact sends a clear message that India will "no longer reward terror and hostility with appeasement".

Sarma also alleged that the country's first prime minister's "misplaced obsession with international approval came at the cost of India's long-term national interest".

He praised the Narendra Modi government's decision to keep the treaty in abeyance.

India's decision to suspend the decades-old treaty follows the killing of 26 people, mostly tourists, in a terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam on Tuesday.

"Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru's signing of the Indus Waters Treaty in 1960 stands as one of the greatest strategic blunders in India's history," Sarma said in a post on X.

"Despite India's natural upper riparian advantage, Nehru, under immense pressure from the then American administration and the World Bank, handed away over 80 per cent of the Indus basin waters to Pakistan, gifting full control over the mighty Indus, Jhelum, and Chenab rivers, while restricting India to the smaller eastern rivers (Ravi, Beas, Sutlej)," the Assam CM claimed.

Sarma said that Pakistan received 135 million acre-feet (MAF) of water annually, while India was left with just 33 MAF.

India's rights over the western rivers were limited to minor irrigation and run-of-the-river hydro projects without meaningful storage, permanently compromising the water needs of Punjab, Haryana, and Jammu & Kashmir, he claimed.

The chief minister maintained that "Nehru's misplaced obsession with international approval came at the cost of India's long-term national interest, weakening India's strategic and agricultural strength in its own land".

He said the Modi government's decision to withdraw from the treaty has "delivered a historic body blow to this injustice".

"By initiating India's withdrawal from the treaty, Modi has reclaimed India's sovereign rights over its rivers, sending a clear message that India will no longer reward terror and hostility with appeasement," he said.

This move strikes at the "heart of Pakistan's fragile economy", where over 75 per cent of agriculture depends on Indus waters, and "corrects a historic betrayal that had shackled India's rightful control for over six decades," Sarma said.

He also claimed, "Modi's action marks the rise of a new, assertive India determined to defend its interests without apology," he added.

India has informed Pakistan of its decision to keep the Indus Waters Treaty in abeyance with immediate effect, saying Pakistan has breached the conditions of the treaty.

Sustained cross-border terrorism by Pakistan targeting Jammu and Kashmir impedes India's rights under the Indus Waters Treaty, India's Secretary of Water Resources, Debashree Mukherjee, said in a letter addressed to her Pakistani counterpart, Syed Ali Murtaza.