India's own words tell a different Indus Waters Treaty story

ISLAMABAD: For more than six decades, India consistently described the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) as a durable, legally binding and successful framework for managing one of the world's most complex transboundary river systems.

Signed in 1960 with the World Bank as a broker, the treaty allocates the waters of the Indus river system between Pakistan and India. 

It has long been regarded as one of the world's most successful water-sharing agreements, surviving wars, military standoffs and decades of political tensions between the two nuclear-armed neighbors.

That longstanding record has come under renewed scrutiny since New Delhi announced it was placing the treaty in abeyance following the May 2025 Pahalgam attack.

Pakistan has rejected the move as a unilateral violation of an internationally-binding agreement and has repeatedly warned against the weaponization of water.

Yet a review of India's own government records, parliamentary statements, court rulings, political leaders and policy experts presents a markedly different picture from New Delhi's current position.

Political leadership

When Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru signed the treaty in Karachi in 1960, he defended it as an instrument of regional peace despite acknowledging the difficult compromises involved.

The agreement also received international recognition. 

Then US President Dwight D Eisenhower described it as a "bright spot" in world diplomacy, according to historical records maintained by the US State Department's Office of the Historian.

Nearly two decades later, India's commitment to the treaty was reaffirmed through the 1978 Salal Dam Agreement signed by then Foreign Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, which New Delhi presented as evidence that the treaty provided a workable mechanism for resolving water disputes.

Even after the 2016 Uri attack, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government opted to maximize India's rights within the treaty rather than withdraw from it, according to an analysis by the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA).

Former Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK) Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti also defended the agreement.

"There have been so many wars, but IWT wasn't touched, because both countries benefited," she said during a press conference in IIOJK.

Government institutions

India's own institutions likewise described the treaty as a stable and enduring legal framework.

In a written reply to the Lok Sabha in 2014, India's Ministry of External Affairs called it a "time tested framework."

The ministry later informed Parliament that India had "always strictly adhered to both the letter and the spirit" of the agreement.

Even after announcing the treaty's abeyance in 2025, India's Ministry of External Affairs said it remained committed to the treaty's "sanctity and integrity" following a Neutral Expert's decision affirming jurisdiction over the Kishenganga and Ratle disputes.

Indian judiciary

India's Supreme Court also acknowledged the treaty's durability.

In 2017, while dismissing a petition challenging the constitutionality of the Indus Waters Treaty, then Chief Justice JS Khehar observed: "This treaty has held good for more than half a century."

Indian experts

Prominent Indian water experts have also consistently described the treaty as one of the world's most successful examples of transboundary water cooperation.

Former Union Water Resources Secretary Ramaswamy Iyer, in his paper Indus Waters Treaty: Reevaluation & Hope, called it a rare diplomatic success that had survived multiple wars and prolonged political tensions.

Similarly, Himanshu Thakkar of the South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People argued that abandoning the treaty would provide India with no meaningful military advantage while undermining its credibility with neighboring countries.

A contrast in record

Taken together, statements by Indian prime ministers, government ministries, Parliament, the Supreme Court and leading policy experts show that New Delhi defended the IWT for decades as a durable legal framework capable of surviving conflict.

Pakistan maintains that India's decision to place the treaty in abeyance departs from those longstanding positions and continues to call for disputes under the agreement to be resolved through the treaty's established legal mechanisms rather than unilateral action.