KARACHI, Dec 7: There is a need to debate the Indus Water Treaty and its contents should be made public so that in future we should not repeat the previous mistakes. This was stated by former federal law and parliamentary minister Barrister Shahida Jamil while speaking as chief guest at a book launching ceremony of “Indus Water Treaty in Retrospect”, organized by the Institution of Engineers Pakistan on Wednesday.

Regretting that any document on this vital issue was not available, she said that the issue had now become all the more important as “we are now debating Kalabagh and other dams.”

Earlier, Engineer Bashir A. Malik, author of the book, highlighted its contents.

He said that water rights of a country being sacrosanct be protected as a territory and not staked gullibly as was done in 1948 or 1960. He was of the view that we suffered because of political instability as there was a kind of musical chair of prime ministers in the country.

On the other hand, he observed that Indian government had always been stable. In this regard, he cited the example of Pundit Nehru who remained prime minister for 17 years from 1947 till his death and he was personally involved in canal water issue since partition.

He said the Indian delegation had received stable guidance and support while Pakistan lacked guidance and continued policy support. He maintained that Hasan Shaheed Surhrawardy was the first and the only prime minister, who took a bold and proactive policy while others had adopted a compromise attitude.

Mr Malik said that Pakistan was represented by non-technical engineering delegation at the water talks held with the World Bank. As a result, we had to surrender our important water sources.

Indus Water Treaty was signed by Pakistan, India and World Bank on Sept 19, 1960 in Karachi. According to the treaty, a gigantic system of works was built to transfer supplies from western rivers to eastern areas.

It included two large dams at Mangla on the Jehlum and Tarbela on the Indus, five barrages and 11 link canals.

Ellahi Bakhsh Soomro, former national assembly speaker, also spoke on the occasion.