Arunachal Lok Sabha MP Ninong Ering advocates for Indo-Sino water treaty

Our Correspondent

Itanagar: Lok Sabha MP from Arunachal Pradesh Ninong Ering has drawn the attention of the Centre towards an impending water war being faced by India once again due to water dispute with China.

The Congress MP from Arunachal East Parliamentary Constituency in a letter to Union Minister of State for Water Resources Arjun Ram Meghwal on Friday said that the Centre should revisit its water ties with neighbouring China as both nations have always facing tensions over the controversial Brahmaputra, called Yarlung Tsangpo in China, which originates from Tibet.

“Tensions often escalated between both nations in the past decade as they have tried to extract maximum hydropower from the river basin. Recently, a China-based news agency released a report stating that China planned to build a 1,000-km long tunnel, world’s longest, between geologically fragile Tibet and Xinjiang province region to supply Tsangpo’s water to the latter and turn it into ‘modem California’,” Ering wrote in his letter.

Chinese officials were quick to refute about such a project, especially when it proclaims devastation for North-Eastern India, especially Assam and Arunachal Pradesh and Bangladesh which are heavily dependent economically and ecologically on the river, the MP said.

“If history is any indicator, China has carried out its hydro-logical projects undeterred leading to the great devastation in Vietnam which was agriculturally dependent on Mekong river. Such scenario calls for a greater need for a diplomatic intervention to ensure that India doesn’t find itself holding the shorter end of the stick at the end of this ambitious project,” the MP pointed out.

NE India has faced great repercussions over the disturbed ties between both nations leading to Assam floods when India didn’t receive Brahmaputra’s hydrological data from its upper riparian neighbour or border tensions in Arunachal Pradesh when China tried to rename places in the region, Ering said in the letter. “Time has come when NE India gets a greater say over water ties between both nations. The Centre cannot ignore China threat and should strive to make NE region less dependent on Brahmaputra water, currently used as a weapon by our neighbour,” he added.