Agreements & MOUs - The Ganga: Water Use in the Indian Subcontinent - page 195

Another minister-level meeting was held in August 1992 in Dhaka, where a new
Joint Committee of Experts (JCE) was formed. It met many times in New Delhi and
Dhaka between 1993 and 1996, but there was tardy progress toward an understand-
ing of the twin issues of sharing and augmentation of the Ganga water at Farakka,
to which was added Dhaka's plea for sharing of water on all other common rivers
by India and Bangladesh.
In the dry seasons from 1989 to 1996, without a formal agreement, India
continued to release water to Bangladesh from the barrage, as before, as per a
superseded sharing formula in the spirit of mutual cooperation and understand-
ing (see Table 8.1). India also continued observing the discharges, downstream and
in the feeder canal and maintained records. In 1992 and 1993, the total flow in
the lean period, between January and June, was much less than in earlier years.
There was acute shortage of water in those two years, both in the Ganga and the
River Bhagirathi. The Hooghly's reach in the vicinity of Calcutta port was heavily
silted, decreasing the depth for incoming and outgoing vessels and raising the cost
on dredging. Some units of India's National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC)
at Farakka had to be shut down, as production fell to all-time low in April. The
entire reach of the Bhagirathi-Hooghly from Jangipur to Diamond Harbour was
also severely affected by siltation.
There was hue and cry in Bangladesh, as water became scarce in the Padma
too in 1992 and 1993. Newspapers reported that the discharge recorded near the
Hardinge Bridge in March 1993 was only 276 cumecs, or 9,761 cusecs, the lowest
ever. The Gorai was affected too and the Ganga-Kapotaksha irrigation-cum-power
project had to be closed for a few days. Khulna industrial belt on its bank as well
as jute and paper mills in the region were affected and had to cut down production.
Crops dried up as ground-water level went down, affecting supply of drinking water.
Salinity intruded in the river and ground water of the Gorai's hinterland. Jammat-
I-Islam organized a big protest rally of over 25,000 people on the dry bed of the
Padma, near the Hardinge Bridge in April 1993. Bangladesh government expressed
its helplessness and disappointment over the slow progress of talks in the JCE but
stuck to its stand of involving Nepal.
The flow increased in the Ganga from 1994 to 1996 and discharge was suffi-
cient at Farakka in the lean season to facilitate equitable distribution as per the
earlier understanding. Public resentment in Bangladesh also disappeared and the
two countries reiterated demand for a permanent solution.
Politics in India was in turmoil formal since 1996. In that year's general election,
the Congress party lost again but no other party or group got absolute majority to
form a government. The President called Atal Behari Vajpayee of the Bharatiya
Janata Party (BJP) and its allies to form a government but after only 13 days, it fell
in a trial of strength in Parliament. Some political parties came together to form
a government, led by H. D. Deva Gauda of Janata Party, who became the Prime
Minister with the support of the Congress in June 1996.
Bangladesh too went for poll in March 1996, in which the Awami League, led
by Sheikh Hasina, daughter of Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, the founder President of
Bangladesh, became the Prime Minister by defeating Sheikh Khaleda Zia's Bengal
Nationalist Party.