Testing waters

Testing waters

Context

We need to evolve credible and institutionalized practices to resolve inter-State river disputes

We need to evolve credible and institutionalized practices to resolve inter-State river disputes

• Last week, the Supreme Court directed the Centre to constitute a tribunal within a month to adjudicate the Mahanadi river water dispute between Odisha and Chhattisgarh.
• The Centre had resisted constituting a tribunal, instead advocating a political resolution through talks.
• During the recent winter session of Parliament, the Union Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari had even asked Odisha to engage with Chhattisgarh through his or the Prime Minister’s office.
• Odisha, however, insisted on a legal route.

The question rises

Why was the Centre unsuccessful in getting Odisha to the table? It is time we invest in right, credible and institutionalised practices for enabling inter-State mediation, coordination and cooperation.

Political rationalities

The States’ escalation of the dispute for pursuing their respective interests is legitimate. However, the underlying political rationalities of actors present a typical paradox of multi-party federal democracies that produce the stalemate. This is for two reasons.

Political opportunism in federal democracies

Mahanadi dispute is an enticing opportunity for both the BJP and BJD for political mobilization  as they both are facing ant-incumbency in the states

Political subjectivity of the contemporary Indian state

The mechanism of the Centre’s mediation before constituting a tribunal for adjudication — prescribed by the current Inter-State River Water Disputes Act, 1956 — is outdated.

Worked when single party dominated: This was conceived when a single party dominated Indian politics, and the Centre could exercise power and influence over States

Polarized regional powers:

• The Centre-States engagement has turned politically subjective with polarised and assertive regional powers. The BJD is unlikely to trust a BJP-led Central government’s initiatives – irrespective of how sincere those efforts might be – with the BJP’s own government in Chhattisgarh.
• The challenge thus is securing credibility of mediation practices — of institutionalising neutrality and objectivity.

Inter-State cooperation

• Odisha’s unwillingness to engage in talks might not necessarily be for political reasons. It can be for the uncertainties associated with the apparent ad hoc framing of the practice of mediation by the Centre.
• State river waters governance is a classic case of collision between Central and State powers. This conundrum of federal governance is not new.

Policy reforms needed like:

• The Act of 1956 for resolving disputes has been amended at least a dozen times since its inception.
• But the River Boards Act, 1956, drafted simultaneously for inter-State collaboration, has not been amended even once since then.

Mediation under Inter state council

• The drive for political resolution suggests a welcome realisation to push the envelope beyond legal routes
• But the practices need to be structured within the constitutional realm.
• For example, the mediation practices may be structured under the Inter-State Council, provided by the Constitution for the exclusive purpose of inter-State coordination.

Conclusion

The ecosystem has to enable not just inter-State dialogue for collaboration, but also other goals of executing agreements and projects for river development, conservation and restoration.