Livelihood at stake

The Teesta river swelled and overflowed its both banks just three weeks ago. Now anybody can cross the river on foot, said Vinod Das.
“A thin stream of water is flowing in the shape of a river. My boat is grounded in the sands of the Teesta. The decade-old fishing net is also torn. It is hard to manage food, let alone buying a new net as most of the time we cannot fish,” said Vinod, a fisherman from Khorda village in Sundarganj, Gaibandha.
“We cannot fish even for two months in a year. The rest of the time we try to fish in other waterbodies or do something else. It is like a dying situation here,” Vinod added.
The recent years of his 73-year-old life have experienced such hardship, he informed.
Not only fishermen Vinod, lives of boatman Salimuddin Mia of Latshala and farmer Amzad Ali of Kapasia, among many others, are also in peril due to narrowing of trans-boundary Teesta.
They came to Dhaka to share their sufferings at an international consultation meeting titled “Framework for Cooperation on South Asian Trans-boundary Water,” organised by Bangladesh Environmental Lawyers Association (BELA) yesterday.
“Our situation would not be like this if India would give us our due share of Teesta water,” Vinod told The Daily Star while describing their sufferings.
Degradation of common rivers is causing immense sufferings to millions of people like Vinod and Salimuddin in this region, speakers said at the two-day meeting attended by regional water experts from India, Pakistan and Nepal.
Eminent Hydrologists and Vice-chancellor of BRAC University Dr Ainun Nishat chaired the opening session titled “South Asian Rivers: Need for a Regional Policy Framework for Integrated Management”.
The speakers said political mistrust is dominating the water sharing issue in South Asia due to absence of a common policy or framework for sharing waters of the trans-boundary rivers.
With a provision to make public information on all hydrological negotiations and development projects, the experts suggested a new approach of basin-wise management. In the process, they recommended involving the civil society members in the management of the international rives.
“Taking experience from the Nile and the Mekong could change the scenario in this region. The speakers said a fresh common approach by promoting environmental justice for all needs to be initiated,” Syeda Rizwana Hasan, chief executive of BELA, said.
Shafaqat Kakakhel, former Pakistani ambassador and UN Assistant Secretary General, talked about Indus-River Commission between India and Pakistan which sustains successfully despite bitter diplomatic ties between the neighbours as all the conflicting issues were addressed widely while making the treaty.
Dipak Gayawali, former minister for water resources of Nepal, presented the working procedure of the Mekong River Commission that shares water in four regional countries of Southeast Asia -- Vietnam, Thailand, Lao PDR and Cambodia.
An independent research panel comprising representatives from the four countries can negotiate with the commission and make public all hydrological data in all local languages.
Dr Mustafizur Rahman, executive director of Centre for Policy Dialogue, said the water sharing issue remains unresolved for decades in the South Asian region.
“Now it could be an opportunity to bridge the gap,” he said at the opening session.
Ritwik Dutta, environmental lawyer, Legal Initiative for Forests and Environment (LIFE), said the decision-making process regarding water sharing issues needs to be questioned seriously as the water issue has become not only environmental but economic, strategic and political issue.
A huge amount of project money allures vested quarters like contractors, constructors and industrialists to take interests in it though the civil society or commoners might not want it.
Five sessions were held yesterday where Shrabani Roy, director, Environment Programme, The Asia Foundation, USA; Partha J Das, programme head, Water, Climate and Hazard (WATCH) programme, AARANYAK, India; Dr Sudhirendar Sharma, Ecological Foundation, India; Khushi Kabir, executive director, Nijera Kori; Farah Kabir, country representative, ActionAid; Mahfuzullah, secretary general, Centre for Sustainable Development (CFSD); Dr Asif Nazrul of Dhaka University, spoke, among others.