WASHINGTON — India’s ambassador to the United States, Vinay Mohan Kwatra, has strongly defended New Delhi’s decision to place the landmark 1960 Indus Water Treaty in abeyance, asserting that Pakistan spent half a century systematically dismantling the goodwill and friendship on which the accord was established. Writing in Newsweek magazine, Kwatra stated that India’s action merely formalised what decades of cross-border terrorism, persistent hostility, and deliberate bureaucratic obstruction from Islamabad had already destroyed.
The ambassador’s article arrived shortly after Pakistan hosted a conference to protest New Delhi’s decision to hold the treaty in abeyance on April 23, 2025. That step was taken just one day after Pakistan-trained terrorists carried out a brutal attack in Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir, killing 26 people, the majority of whom were tourists. Kwatra stressed that while the treaty’s preamble explicitly declared it was concluded in a spirit of friendship, Pakistan’s actions over the past five decades directly contradicted those founding principles.
Brokered in 1960, the Indus Water Treaty allocated India control over three rivers carrying approximately 20 per cent of the Indus basin’s total water, while Pakistan received rights to rivers carrying roughly 80 per cent. Kwatra highlighted that this significant asymmetry severely stifled regional development in Indian territories for decades. Despite these unequal terms, India consistently honoured the agreement, only to be met by Pakistani military aggression in 1965, 1971, and 1999, alongside high-profile terrorist incidents including the 2001 Parliament attack, the 2008 Mumbai attacks, Uri, Pathankot, Pulwama, and Pahalgam.
The envoy also pointed out that Pakistan repeatedly obstructed India’s efforts to renegotiate the treaty to reflect modern technological advancements that would allow India to develop its clean hydropower potential. He argued that proponents of renewed bilateral dialogue fail to learn from past efforts, noting that expecting a different outcome from the same failed approach is illogical. Citing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s policy that blood and water cannot flow together, Kwatra reiterated that Pakistan must dismantle its state-sponsored terror infrastructure before any meaningful cooperation can occur. He concluded that Pakistan’s current water scarcity stems from internal mismanagement and urged Islamabad to focus on fixing its water productivity rather than blaming New Delhi for its domestic failings.
