Analyze the impact of hydropolitics on Indo-Bangladesh relations. (2020, 10 Marks)
Hydropolitics is water turned into a question of power, identity and bargaining. Between India and Bangladesh it starts from geography: of 54 shared rivers, India is the upper riparian on every one, while Bangladesh’s dry-season farming, its defence against salinity and the Sundarbans depend on decisions taken upstream. Water has shaped the relationship more than almost any treaty.
Farakka: grievance as foreign policy
- The Farakka Barrage (commissioned 1975) diverts Ganga water to flush the Hooghly for Kolkata port; the dispute began when Bangladesh was still East Pakistan.
- After 1975 it gave Ziaur Rahman’s government a ready anti-India cause. Dhaka took it to the UN General Assembly in 1976, breaking India’s preference for bilateralism.
- Short-term pacts (1977, then memoranda in 1982 and 1985) lapsed in 1988. The eight years without any arrangement remain Dhaka’s measure of Indian goodwill.
1996: water as an anchor of goodwill
The Ganga Waters Treaty (December 1996) settled the dispute for thirty years with a sliding-scale formula and a guaranteed 35,000 cusecs in alternate ten-day spells of the leanest season. It became the strongest proof that India would accept binding obligations to a smaller neighbour.
Teesta: the credibility deficit
- The 1983 ad hoc split (39% India, 36% Bangladesh) was never formalised, and the 2011 draft collapsed on the eve of signature when West Bengal objected.
- Fifteen years of unkept promises became Bangladesh’s evidence that India’s word cannot be delivered, and they gave China an opening: Beijing’s roughly US$1 billion Teesta restoration project, near the Siliguri Corridor, was backed again during Tarique Rahman’s June 2026 Beijing visit.
Mechanisms of impact
- Two-level game: because water is a State subject, an agreement must satisfy a State government as well as Dhaka, in Robert D. Putnam’s sense (1988). West Bengal enabled 1996 and blocked Teesta; Bihar’s leaders now oppose renewal in the present form.
- Securitisation: in Bangladeshi politics water is framed as national survival, so each lean season becomes a test of sovereignty rather than a technical matter.
- Resilient functional layer: flood-data sharing, the Joint Rivers Commission and the Feni (2019) and Kushiyara (2022) arrangements have survived every rupture, including 2024–25.
Conclusion
Hydropolitics has been both the barometer and the driver of the relationship: where India delivered, as in 1996, trust followed; where it did not, as with Teesta, Bangladeshi nationalism and Chinese influence filled the gap. With Dhaka seeking a new Ganga treaty before the December 2026 expiry and West Bengal’s veto gone, India now has its best chance in a decade to re-anchor ties with the BNP government in shared interests.