Come clean on Brahmaputra dam, India tells China

India continued its verbal offensive against China on Thursday, saying it was opposed to the construction of a dam on the Brahmaputra, the lifeline of the north-eastern states, and was verifying if the project was underway despite denials by Beijing. In short, New Delhi made it clear that it could no longer take China’s assurances at face value.

A media report on Thursday said China was constructing a massive dam on the river and that the project was inaugurated in March. The ministry of external affairs (MEA) does not generally react to newspaper reports, but with increasing strain in ties between the neighbours, India is not brushing these allegations under the carpet.

“The Indian side has taken up with the Chinese side reports about the construction of a large dam or diversion project on the Brahmaputra,” MEA spokesman Vishnu Prakash said, referring to the meeting of an expert-level mechanism set up in November 2006.

New Delhi’s understanding was that no work would be initiated till an agreement was reached to ensure that the diversion of the Brahmaputra waters would not adversely affect the north-eastern states.

The MEA statement went into the details of the media report, saying: “The Brahmaputra flows for about 1,625 km inside the Tibet Autonomous Region of the People’s Republic of China and for a further 918 km inside India.

“The Chinese side has categorically denied that there is a plan to build any large-scale diversion project on the Brahmaputra… We are looking into the said newspaper report to ascertain whether there are recent developments that suggest any change in the position conveyed to us by the Government of China.”

But if India’s message was strong, Wednesday’s editorial in the Chinese Communist Party mouthpiece Peoples Daily was scathing. India is “obsessed” with a “hegemonic mentality” and refuses “to drop [its] pretentious airs when dealing with neighbours like Pakistan”, the editorial said.

It also sarcastically commented on India’s developing ties with the United States, saying New Delhi followed a policy to “befriend the far and attack the near”. The editorial said “resentment still simmered” from India’s wars with China and Pakistan. “If India really wants to be a superpower, such a policy is short-sighted and immature.”

Business leaders on either side of the border are worried about the deteriorating Sino-Indian ties. FICCI on Thursday said it was apprehensive that the growing economic links between the two countries would be affected because of fraying relations.

“FICCI notices that strident statements have been issued increasingly by China lately, and as a result if the overall atmosphere of India-China relations is queered, then business and economic relations can’t but get affected,” said FICCI president Harsh Pati Singhania.

FICCI quoted statistics showing bilateral trade was inching towards the $45-billion mark, making China India’s largest trading partner.