ISLAMABAD  -  The Hague based Per­manent Court of Arbi­tration (PCA) Thursday accepted Pakistan's po­sition, while rejecting India's objections to the assumption of jurisdic­tion by the internation­al forum in the matter concerning the change of designs in Kishan­ganga and Ratle Hydro Electric plants.

Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) has accepted Pakistan’s po­sition that it had com­petence to determine a dispute between India and Pakistan regard­ing change of designs in 330MW Kishengan­ga Hydroelectric Plant (KHEP) and 850 MW Ratle Hydro Electric plants by India. 

The court of arbitra­tion rejected India’s ob­jection to the assump­tion of jurisdiction by the international forum - PCA. 

Now the internation­al court will start hear­ing Pakistan’s claim on merit to the effect that above mentioned two projects’ designs are in breach of the In­dus Water Treaty of 1961. 

Pakistan was represented by a team of international experts as­sisted by a team of the Attorney General for Pakistan including Advocate Zohair Waheed and Advocate Leena Nishter. Barris­ter Ahmed Irfan Aslam acted as Pakistan’s agent in the PCA. Pa­kistan has serious objections on the design aspects of 330MW Kishenganga Hydroelectric Plant (KHEP) on the Jhelum Riv­er and 850MW Ratle Hydroclec­tric Plant (RHEP) on River Chen­ab in Indian Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IOJK).

As per the officials docu­ments available with The Na­tion, the questions on KHEP were discussed in seven meet­ings (in the period 2006 to 2010 and then in the period 2014 to 2015) while RHEP was discussed in four meetings of the Permanent Indus Commis­sion (PIC) (in the period 2013 to 2015). The questions could not be resolved in PIC and Pa­kistan Commissioner for Indus Waters (PCIW) declared fail­ure of the PIC in resolving the issues and indicated that Paki­stan would now take the mat­ters to the third forum for res­olution, i.e. Neutral Expert (NE) or Court of Arbitration (CoA). Subsequently, following the procedure in the Treaty, Paki­stan invoked the disputes under Article IX of the Treaty in Feb­ruary 2016. As part of the pro­cedure specified by the Treaty a meeting of the Secretaries of the two countries was held to re­solve the issues which could not succeed and Pakistan submit­ted its request for arbitration to India on 19 August 2016. In­dia had earlier indicated that it would seek resolution of the dif­ferences through the NE forum on 11 August 2016, while Paki­stan had expressed its intention that it wanted to go to CoA for the same purpose in February 2016. On 6th September 2016 India had placed its request for appointment of NE with Paki­stan and on 4th October 2016 with the World Bank.

Initially, the World Bank was indecisive which forum to form and indicated that it would form both forums for resolution of disputes. India initially insisted on referring the matters back to PIC to which Pakistan did not agree. India took advantage of the pause and completed the construction of KHEP and an­nounced in July 2017 that it would carry out initial filling of its reservoir. Pakistan pro­tested to the Bank as the Bank had been assuring Pakistan that construction was not going on and asked the Bank to end the pause and proceed, according to the Treaty, for completing the empanelment of the court. The Bank took up the matter with India who agreed to secretary level talks with Pakistan.

Two rounds of secretary lev­el talks held between both the countries under the auspices of the World Bank but it failed to achieve any results as India re­jected all the options presented by the World Bank, while Paki­stan had accepted three options.

After receiving Pakistan’s re­sponse, the Bank again asked for India’s response who rejected all the four options as non-Trea­ty-complaint and asked for ap­pointment of NE for resolution of the differences. On this, Pakistan asked the Bank that since all the options presented by the Bank have been rejected by India, Pa­kistan also asks for empanel­ment of the Court of Arbitration for resolution of the disputes.

Meanwhile, Pakistan said that it remained fully committed to the implementation of Indus Water Treaty, including its dis­pute settlement mechanism.

Foreign Office spokesper­son while responding to media queries concerning the deci­sion by the Court of Arbitration in the Hague on the question of its competence to hear Paki­stan-India water disputes, said, “the Government of Pakistan is in receipt of the Award of the Court of Arbitration, addressing its competence and the way for­ward on the disputes between Pakistan and India concerning the Kishenganga and Ratle Hy­droelectric Projects; and, wider questions of the interpretation and application of the Indus Waters Treaty.”

She said, “The Indus Waters Treaty is a foundational agree­ment between Pakistan and In­dia on water sharing.