Muhammad Yunus calls for resolving issues over Teesta water-sharing treaty with India

Dhaka: Bangladesh's Chief Adviser Muhammad Yunus has said the interim government would pursue with India ways to resolve the differences over the long-pending Teesta water sharing treaty, as delaying it for years serves no purpose for either nation.

In an interview with PTI at his official residence in Dhaka, Yunus stated that the water-sharing issue between the two countries must be resolved according to international norms, emphasising that lower riparian countries like Bangladesh have specific rights that they seek to uphold.

“By sitting over this issue (water sharing), it is not serving any purpose. If I know how much water I will get, even if I am not happy and sign it, it would be better. This issue has to be resolved,” he said.

Replying to a query on whether the interim government would push for resolving the issues over the Teesta water-sharing treaty at the earliest, he said the new regime will pursue it.

“Push is a big word; I am not saying it. We will pursue it. But we have to sit together and resolve it,” he told PTI.

India and Bangladesh were set to sign a deal on Teesta water sharing during then-Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to Dhaka in 2011, but West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee declined to endorse it, citing a scarcity of water in her state.

“This is not a new issue but a very old issue. We have spoken on this issue on several occasions. The discussions began during the period of Pakistan's rule. While we all wanted this treaty to be finalised, even the Indian government was ready for it. However, the state government of West Bengal was not ready for it. We need to resolve it,” he said.

Yunus reiterated that lower riparian countries like Bangladesh have specific rights that they seek to uphold.

“We have to resolve this issue according to international norms. The lower riparian countries have certain rights, and we want those rights,” he said.

His remarks come days after the interim government’s Adviser on Water Resources, Syeda Rizwana Hasan, told PTI that Dhaka would push for restarting the dialogue regarding the Teesta water-sharing treaty with New Delhi and asserted that both countries should adhere to international principles regarding water-sharing between upper riparian and lower riparian countries.

Speaking about the flood situation in Bangladesh and reports from Dhaka blaming India for the floods, Yunus said that until the treaty is signed, a humanitarian approach can be adopted to deal with such crises.

“When the High Commissioner (of India) came to meet me, I said that we can work on better management to see how the situation can be controlled during the floods. For such coordination between two countries, we don’t need any treaty." "We can work on this together on humanitarian grounds and resolve this, as this will ease the suffering of the masses. Such humanitarian steps would really help,” he said.

Monsoon rainfall-triggered floods in deltaic Bangladesh and upstream Indian regions have killed several people and marooned or affected nearly three million others in Bangladesh, posing a huge administrative challenge to the newly installed interim government amid a political transition.

India has described as factually incorrect the reports from Bangladesh that the current flood situation in certain parts of the country has been caused by the opening of a dam on the Gumti River in Tripura.

The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) in New Delhi stated that floods in the shared rivers between the two countries are a "shared" problem affecting people on both sides and require close mutual cooperation to resolve.

Speaking about the contentious issue of border killings, Yunus condemned it and said killing is not a solution to dealing with it.

Yunus described the alleged killings of Bangladeshi citizens at India's border as "callousness".

“Killing someone is not a solution, as there are legal ways to deal with this. There has to be a ground mechanism and legal procedure to handle it. This is a one-sided thing. No one is crossing the border to capture your country; those who are being killed by shooting are just couriers. This is callousness. This has to stop,” he said.

The Border Security Force (BSF) of India has accused Bangladeshi smugglers and infiltrators of crossing over the border and attacking Indian forces when challenged.

They have raised the issue with the Bangladesh counterpart BGB on several occasions. West Bengal shares a total of 2,217 kilometres of its border with Bangladesh, along with Tripura (856 km), Meghalaya (443 km), Assam (262 km), and Mizoram (318 km).

Deaths at times occur along the Bangladesh-India border due to alleged infiltrators trying to cross into India illegally, cross-border firing, and cattle smuggling.