Between the convening night of 06-07 July, India opened the gates of its dams, discharging millions cusecs of water to flow towards Pakistan. The concerned Indian authorities, despite their pre-planning of launching such a course of action directly affecting the neighbourly country, considered it proper to intimate Pakistani counterparts at 1430 PST on 7 July 2005, just 6-7 hours prior to the estimated time of their waves of inundant-water reaching Pakistan.
Whatever the reason for opening such a huge quantum of water the fact remains, it was not a natural inundation of water but a planned action by India causing sudden floods destroying the life and property on large-scale in Pakistan.
Numerous villages were swept away, thousands of acres of agricultural land, ready with crops, washed away, hundreds of animals drowned and many villagers rendered homeless, creating food, medical, finance and rehabilitation problems for Pakistan.
This Indian stored water, which was manually diverted to storm into Pakistan, was not a natural calamity for Pakistan but very much contributed to the already existing floods in Pakistani rivers on account of the melting snow on the mountains of Himalayas.
The question arises, why did India suddenly open such a huge quantity of water altogether? If its discharge was so necessary, why was it not done in directions other than of Pakistan? If there was no other alternate except flooding the Pakistani sides of the rivers, why was it not done in instalments, so as to equally save the life and property of Pakistani citizens?
Why did India inform the Pakistani side of their planned action at such a short notice? Why was the action plan not designed by the concerned Indian authorities after taking their Pakistani counterparts into confidence, so as to handle the situation with joint efforts of both the countries rather than pushing it entirely into the Pakistani side.
This planned incident of causing a flood by India is contrary to the on-going process of Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) between India and Pakistan and the sincere endeavours being undertaken by the leaders of the two countries.
In this context, the Indian leadership and the concerned authorities are requested to realistically analyse the type of message, this incident conveys to Pakistan.
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