Opinion | PM Modi Shuts Pakistan’s ‘Hookah-Paani’; Will China Hit India Back On Brahmaputra?

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Last Updated:April 24, 2025, 20:11 IST

The India-Pakistan water dynamic, deeply intertwined with security and historical conflict, stands unique and cannot be readily transposed onto the India-China relationship

India’s message to GHQ Rawalpindi and Islamabad is clear: your decades-long campaign of training and sponsoring terrorists has led us to shut your “hookah-paani.” (PTI)

India has walked out of the Indus Waters Treaty. A treaty that survived three wars has effectively been junked by the Modi government. The medium to long-term impact of this decision will wreck Pakistan’s already dilapidated economy. Pakistan’s agricultural and energy sectors will take an unimaginable beating soon. India’s message to GHQ Rawalpindi and Islamabad is clear: your decades-long campaign of training and sponsoring terrorists has led us to shut your “hookah-paani."

In October 2024, I had reported that there was growing angst within the Government of India over the Indus Waters Treaty. Back then, an emerging view in the corridors of power was that the water-sharing treaty has been detrimental to Indian interests for decades, while being overly accommodative of Pakistan. This, despite the fact that Pakistan has used all resources at its disposal to bleed India using terrorism and a strategy of “a thousand cuts". It must be mentioned here that the treaty accorded more than 80 per cent of the total resources in the Indus River Basin to Pakistan, apart from financial aid to build infrastructure on western Punjab’s rivers.

Six months later, the deed is done. India has laid the ground to choke Pakistan off water supplies that sustain it as a country. However, there is some scepticism over what the ramifications of such a move will be in the long term. After all, couldn’t China theoretically do the same with rivers flowing into India?

While superficially tempting as a geopolitical parallel, this comparison is fundamentally flawed, dangerously simplistic, and ignores decades of unique context. It constitutes a false equivalence, both morally and strategically.

The crux of the matter lies in the reasons behind India’s potential shift regarding the IWT. This is not a whimsical decision or a sudden move towards resource nationalism. As reported by me earlier, such a move has been months in planning.

India’s decision to suspend its treaty obligations stems from decades of provocation by Pakistan. This includes, most critically, the persistent use of state-sponsored terrorism targeting India, leading to devastating attacks like 26/11 in Mumbai, attacks on military installations in Uri and Pulwama and most recently, the massacre of 26 civilians in Pahalgam. Added to this are repeated ceasefire violations along the Line of Control and consistent diplomatic intransigence on addressing India’s core security concerns.

India’s track record demonstrates remarkable restraint. The IWT, brokered by the World Bank in 1960, has survived multiple wars (1965, 1971, Kargil 1999) and numerous terrorist attacks planned and executed from Pakistani soil. India upheld its treaty commitments even when the justifications for suspension, based on Pakistan’s hostile actions, were arguably present much earlier. Therefore, India’s decision may appear as an aggressive first move, but it is, in fact, a much-needed response to Pakistan. India argues it has exhausted diplomatic avenues and displayed patience far beyond standard international norms.

Contrast this with the India-China dynamic. While the relationship is complex and fraught with its own serious challenges – most notably the ongoing border standoff triggered by the Galwan Valley clashes – the fundamental context is entirely different. Moreover, the marked improvements in India-China bilateral ties since October last year provide India with much more legroom to deal with Pakistan in a manner it deems fit, without worrying about how Beijing would react.

I suspect the Chinese have decided to sit this one out entirely. They are under too much pressure from Trump. The global environment right now is EXTREMELY CONDUCIVE for India to enforce its writ. https://t.co/hPNOsucPz3— Sanbeer Singh Ranhotra (@SSanbeer) April 23, 2025

Firstly, India is not a state sponsor of terrorism targeting China. There is no parallel history of India orchestrating attacks within China or actively supporting violent separatist movements there. Therefore, China lacks the specific, security-based justification that India cites in its potential calculus regarding Pakistan and the IWT.

Secondly, the nature of the relationship, while tense, operates on a different plane. Despite the border friction, both nations have engaged in diplomatic and military talks aimed at de-escalation and stabilisation, particularly over the past year. While trust is low, channels of communication remain active in managing the bilateral complexities. This is distinct from the deep-seated animosity and the specific issue of cross-border terrorism that plagues India-Pakistan relations.

Thirdly, there is no overarching, legally binding, comprehensive water-sharing treaty between India and China equivalent to the IWT. While there are Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs) concerning hydrological data sharing for certain rivers like the Brahmaputra (Yarlung Tsangpo) during the flood season, China, as the upper riparian state, operates with significantly fewer constraints than India does under the IWT framework.

Beijing’s actions regarding river flows would be driven by its own developmental priorities, energy needs, or potentially, geopolitical leverage – not as a response to Indian state-sponsored terrorism, because no such thing exists.

Therefore, suggesting China could simply “do the same" as India might consider regarding the IWT is a dangerous oversimplification. It ignores:

The Trigger: India’s action is framed as a response to specific, severe security provocation in Pahalgam. China lacks this justification from India.
The History: India points to decades of restraint despite conflict and attacks.
The Framework: The IWT provides a specific legal context for India-Pakistan water relations, absent in the India-China scenario.
The Moral Dimension: Equating a potential response to alleged state-sponsored terror with hypothetical actions driven by other motives conflates fundamentally different scenarios.