Integrated joint management of 54 rivers must to save Bangladesh from disasters: Int'l Farakka Committee 

The International Farakka Committee (IFC) has called for an agreement for integrated joint management of all rivers shared with India in view of the devastating floods that have hit the southeast, east, northeast and north regions of Bangladesh, affecting hundreds of millions of people.

In a joint statement, the IFC leaders said this time the Ministry of External Affairs of India has given an explanatory reply after many days to the allegations of the unusual floods in Gumti River and the opening of the sluice gates of the Farakka Barrage. 

"Regarding Gumti, they said the opening of gates of Dumbur Dam in Tripura cannot be blamed for severe floods caused by heavy rains. On the other hand, regarding the Ganga they said opening the gates of the Farakka Barrage and releasing the flood water caused by heavy rain upstream into the 'Ganga/Padma' river is a normal development during the wet season."

There was no statement about the Teesta, although two or three waves of severe floods in the basin of this river cause not only crop loss in Bangladesh every monsoon, but thousands of families are also left homeless due to the breach of the banks, the IFC said.

However, during the dry season, the entire Teesta water is being diverted from West Bengal's Gazal Doba Barrage.

On the Gumti floods, India's think tank, SANDRP (South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People), said the flood would have been less severe had the release of water from the reservoir above Tripura's Dumbur dam started at least two days before the water level crossed the danger level. 

In this regard, they have raised the question of negligence or human error. Moreover, it was not possible to transmit flood warning messages for two days due to the lack of electricity in the water measuring station located downstream of the dam due to the flood. That means, Bangladesh did not receive the warning message on time.

The IFC said this flood disaster is not only caused by global warming but also by negligence/error in taking timely action. 

The only way to reduce the disaster in the downstream country as a result of such human error in the upstream country is joint management from the origin of the river to its outfall in the sea. This is the opinion of all water experts in the world today, it added.

Of the 54 shared rivers that flow through Bangladesh and India, there is an agreement only on the Ganges, that too on the basis of an outdated notion of water sharing at the border. The agreement will expire in 2026. 

"The two countries have been talking about an agreement on the Teesta for the past 13 years. But practically nothing happens. The situation is such that Bangladesh has to take flood water in monsoon, but it has no right to water in dry season. International law does not support this," the IFC said.

The IFC leaders have called on the Bangladesh government to take initiatives for integrated basin wide joint management of 54 rivers to save the country from disasters.

The joint statement was signed by IFC New York Chairman Sayed Tipu Sultan, General Secretary Mohammad Hossain Khan and Organizing Secretary Ataur Rahman Ata; IFC Bangladesh President Prof. Dr. Jasim Uddin Ahmad, General Secretary Syed Irfanul Bari and IFC Coordinator Mostafa Kamal Majumder.