Thaindian News

Jammu, April 19 (IANS) Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) leader Mehbooba Mufti Sunday said the water sharing treaty with Pakistan was discriminatory as it denies Jammu and Kashmir its due share of waters of the rivers flowing through it.
“I will launch a mass movement if the state is not adequately compensated over the use of its waters by the central government,” Mehbooba Mufti told an election meeting in Kishtwar, 230 km northeast of Jammu.

If the “unfair” Indus Water Treaty was “not scrapped” and the state’s two important hydroelectric projects - Dulhasti and Salal - were not handed over to Jammu and Kashmir, PDP workers would “come on streets to force New Delhi to compensate the losses suffered due to the discriminatory water sharing agreement, Mehbooba said.

According to the agreement, India exclusively uses all of the waters of the eastern rivers - Sutlej, Beas and Ravi - and their tributaries before the point where the rivers enter Pakistan.

The treaty signed in 1960 gives Pakistan its exclusive rights to use waters of the western rivers - Indus, Jhelum and Chenab - the three rivers flowing through Jammu and Kashmir.

Mehbooba Mufti also demanded scrapping of “all unfair agreements signed with the National Hydro Power Corporation (NHPC) for the exploitation of natural resources in Jammu and Kashmir”.

“For the lust of power, the National Conference has bartered natural resources of the state by signing unfair agreements with the NHPC,” she said.