India’s Tipaimukh Dam and Bangladesh’s Policy Response: an Analysis

India has undertaken the Tipaimukh project on the Barak River. This river is very important for the north-eastern region of the country. Once built, this project will have various adverse impacts on Bangladesh. Though India has repeatedly said that she will not do anything that is damaging for Bangladesh, the project has only been deferred temporarily. This paper analyzes all the policy alternatives that Bangladesh has at her disposal and argues that the only feasible option that the country has is to ask India for the closure of the project.


INTRODUCTION
Tipaimukh dam is a hydroelectric project, proposed unilaterally by India, to be built on the Barak River -an international river that crosses into Bangladesh, divulges into Surma and Kushiara and creates the third largest river system of the country. The project received environmental clearance approval in 2008 from the Indian authority. This 319 square km project is just 100 km off the Bangladesh border and would require the relocation of 50,000-60,000 indigenous people. The desired benefit from the project is 1500MW of power generation while it will put enormous environmental, economic and social costs on Bangladesh.
The organization of the paper is as follows -this introductory section is followed by a discussion of anthropocentric and non-anthropocentric perspectives, water as a commodity and legal aspects. Then the study analyzes the impacts of the project, if completed, on Bangladesh. Discussion on a regional strategic response is presented next. The paper then specifies the policy options, sets the criteria for policy evaluation and appraises all the options individually and makes the best possible policy suggestion.

PHILOSOPHICAL AND LEGAL VIEWS
Anthropocentric and Non-Anthropocentric views: Though anthropocentric (utilitarian) views would usually support projects like dam, the situation is much different here. Because this project would benefit one country at the expense of the other (even it will displace many of the indigenous people in the home country). From a non-anthropocentric viewpoint it's not an acceptable project as it would change the environment. For instance, humans, an element of the environment, try to be its master by controlling nature. But all members of the ecosystem have rights and hence it's immoral to exploit and destroy the ecosystem [1]. In a similar line, it has been argued that while dealing with environment the concentration of the ethical system should be on keeping nature unchanged and preserve the natural order and rhythm. Interference would throw the ecosystem off balance [2]. Another view is that humans need nature for their existence and conserving the nature is the way to maintain a sustainable environment. Also, poorer nations 1 receive means to subsist and survive from the nature and destroying them would eliminate the means [3]. When it comes to trans-1 Rich nations do get services from the nature too. But for poorer nations its relative importance is higher.

International Letters of Social and Humanistic Sciences
Online: boundary water, the evidence of common normative structures leading to interstate cooperation is rather scanty. Moreover little is the evidence that international legal principles are approaching the right direction [4].
Viewing water as a commodity: One approach is to define water as a commodity and its allocation would depend on the demand and human valuation. Utilitarian would allocate the product according to human value. Human rights and environment are not very important here -there are just other sets of demands. Another approach is the economic way that treats water as a commodity whose price is determined by the market clearing condition of supply equals demand. However these approaches don't resolve the international issues related to water resources. It's very difficult to develop a satisfactory compensation mechanism when some people in another country are deprived of the resources and its related services. It's hard to find a mid-point that would address the socio-economic, political, biophysical and ethical concerns of both countries.

Legal Aspects:
The 1997 UN Convention on International Watercourses requires every state to refrain from undertaking any unilateral project on a trans-boundary river [5]. This has been ratified by only 16 countries and neither Bangladesh nor India has signed it. However the Ganges water treaty (article IX) of 1996 between Bangladesh and India requires both countries to negotiate and share water in all common rivers. This treaty is valid for a period of 30 years and any unilateral decision by one country violates the agreement. According to the report of the World Commission on Dams: "dams have made an important and significant contribution to human development, in too many cases an unacceptable and often unnecessary price has been paid to secure those benefits, especially in social and environmental terms, by people displaced, by communities downstream, by taxpayers and by the natural environment [6]." The situation becomes more complicated when the benefits are enjoyed by one country whereas it brings sufferings for another.

IMPACTS IF THE PROJECT IS COMPLETED
Adverse Environmental impacts on Bangladesh 2 : Barak supplies 7-8% of Bangladesh's total water. Two main rivers of the north-eastern region of the country, Surma and Kushiara, and their many tributaries and distributaries depend on the Barak River. These rivers help agriculture, irrigation, navigation, water supply, fisheries, wildlife and various industries (mostly fertilizer, electricity and gas). The dam will cause disruptive & poor water supply, sedimentation, reduced ground water, lower biodiversity, decreased agricultural & fish production, poor water quality, floods, fragmented ecosystems, earthquakes etc. These rivers are connected to Meghna (one of the three most important rivers of the country) and hence will cause similar impacts in the Meghna basin.
The site selected for the project is one of the most geologically active and unstable region in the world. Between 1897 and 1992, there have been 65 earthquakes that measured 6.5 or higher on the Richter scale 3 in this area. Building a 162.8m high dam with a storage capacity of 15,900 mill cubic meters entail a potential risk for a massive disaster 4 .

It may cause political instability in the country:
In recent years, this issue has been dominating the political and media's discourse in Bangladesh. There have been massive protests, rallies etc. demanding a complete annulment of the project. Given the public support toward these programs, if the current government can resolve the issue, it would be recognized as a big success.
The rights of the indigenous people: Also there are indigenous people (in both countries) who live and depend on the waters. They have been agitating since the initial stage of the project. According to the UN Declaration on the rights of Indigenous peoples (2008) and recommendations of the sessions of UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues at UN HQs (May 2009), indigenous people have the right of self determination over their land and resources and have defined rights to set their development priorities on how to manage and use their resources [7,8].
It can be a source of future conflicts: Concerns and tensions over the use and management of trans-boundary rivers are much more common today as water has become an increasingly important resource in this over populated and conflict-prone region. Being an upstream country, India has the potential to exploit water resources. Once the dam is built, India will have more control over the water management and can use it as a strategic device. This dam can be a source of future conflict as it would affect Bangladesh in every sphere -political, economic, financial and social.
The Awami League is ruling Bangladesh since 2007. Traditionally the Awami league and the Congress, both recognized as one of the two major parties in Bangladesh and India respectively, have a friendly relationship. In recent years Indian People's Party (BJP) has emerged as the largest political party of India and it is currently in power. BJP has not changed India's policy regarding Bangladesh. But both BJP and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (Bangladesh's other major political player) are right wing nationalist parties. If BNP comes to power, Indian government is likely to change its policies toward its neighbor. So, even if the present Indian government says that they will not do anything that harms Bangladesh that is not a credible promise. As the following table shows, only in two of the four possible cases, cooperation between the two countries is a potential outcome, given the present behavior of the parties. However, all these outcomes are not and should not be treated as equally likely. been a couple of water sharing treaties between the two countries -but Bangladesh never got the stipulated share of the water. Also that project caused drying up of large parts of the country, affecting navigation and adversely influencing the environment, agriculture and fisheries. India's dam on the Teesta River has affected the performance of Bangladesh's irrigation barrage, hurting agriculture and environment in the country's north.