Agreements & MOUs - The Ganga: Water Use in the Indian Subcontinent - page 144

Chapter 10
Agreements & MOUs
India's parliamentary election in 1977 saw a dramatic change of power from Indira
Gandhi to Morarji Desai of the Janata Party, ending a 30-year rule by the Indian
National Congress, founded by a British civil servant, Alan Octavian Hume in
1885. The country's foreign policy remained, by and large, the same as formulated
by the first Prime Minister after India's Independence from nearly 200 years of
British colonial rule, Jawaharlal Nehru and followed by his two successors - Lal
Bahadur Shastri and Indira Gandhi. Initially, the sharing of the Ganga water after
the construction of Farakka Barrage in 1975 posed no problem with Bangladesh in
the ambience of cordiality and friendship with the new republic, in whose emer-
gence India played a crucial role by giving ample diplomatic and military help.
Bangladesh also felt that the transfer of power from the Congress to the Janata Party
in 1977 created a congenial atmosphere for coming to an understanding with India
on co-sharing of the Ganga water and reconciliation of conflicting claims, leaving
aside technical difficulties, as far as possible. Assuming power, the Janata gov-
ernment focussed on the water dispute and other bilateral issues with Bangladesh
and sent Defence Minister, Jagjivan Ram who was in charge of irrigation in Indira
Gandhi's cabinet, heading a delegation of officials to Dhaka on 15th April 1977 for
discussions with Bangladesh government. After three days of discussions, the two
governments issued a brief joint statement, as under:
An understanding has been reached (on Farakka), details of which will be worked out at
a meeting of the officials of the two governments, to be held in New Delhi, as soon as
possible.
A minister-level meeting was followed by an officers' meet, next month, i.e., in
May, in New Delhi and in Dhaka in July, that year. A short-term agreement was
initiated at midnight of 30 th September 1977 in New Delhi and finally signed on
5 th November 1977 at Dhaka by S. S. Barnala, India's Minister of Agriculture and
Irrigation and Rear Admiral M. H. Khan on behalf of Bangladesh. This has come to
be known as the Farakka Agreement, the full text of which is given in Appendix B.
Thus, a long outstanding and delicate dispute, fraught with technical, political and
economic implications and hazards was solved for the time being.
The Agreement had 15 Articles, one Schedule and two side letters. It was sub-
divided into three major parts - A, B, and C. The period for water-sharing between