Transboundary Water Resources In South Asia – Analysis

Eurasia Review | Enrico D'Ambrogio

China initiated construction of the 60-gigawatt Medog Hydropower Station on Tibet's Yarlung Tsangpo in July 2025, intensifying downstream water security risks across South Asia. The massive dam gives Beijing structural leverage over transboundary flows supporting more than one billion people across the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna and Indus basins. Climate volatility worsens these upper-riparian friction points, as highlighted by a September 2026 World Meteorological Organization report marking 2025 among the driest river years in decades.

Tensions are compounding downstream. India suspended the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty following the 2025 Pahalgam attack, though a Court of Arbitration deemed the decision impermissible. Concurrently, New Delhi faces domestic opposition from Bihar as the 1996 Ganges Water Sharing Treaty with Bangladesh approaches its December 2026 expiration. Meanwhile, upstream states like Nepal and Bhutan balance Indian hydro-exports against Chinese offers, while Afghanistan and Pakistan lack formal accords for the shared Kabul-Kunar basin.

Comment

Unilateral adjustments to transboundary river regimes generate a severe strategic trade-off between immediate geopolitical leverage and long-term institutional credibility. Upper-riparian attempts to restrict hydrometric data or alter natural flows yield brief diplomatic leverage while eroding the predictable legal frameworks that preserve regional stability. India's suspension of the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty following the 2025 Pahalgam attack demonstrates this dynamic, exchanging six decades of bilateral dispute architecture for tactical pressure against Pakistan.

This regulatory breakdown creates secondary systemic instability across shared basin infrastructure. Downstream sovereign entities lose the baseline predictability required to manage seasonal agricultural cycles and flood control systems. Consequently, the breakdown of data exchange under the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty forces the Pakistan Water and Power Development Authority to maintain higher defensive storage buffers at the Tarbela Dam.

Strategic Question for Discussion

If executive suspensions of the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty become standard diplomatic countermeasures, how can lower-riparian infrastructure operators effectively calibrate risk models at installations like the Tarbela Dam?

The pattern suggests that downstream operators will increasingly rely on real-time remote sensing and satellite altimetry to offset official data blackouts. My assessment is that this shift reduces operational predictability, raising seasonal flood management costs and accelerating unilateral defensive dam construction across lower-riparian territories. Hydraulic planning thereby transitions from cooperative treaty mechanisms to uncoordinated tactical mitigation.

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