AN ECONOMIC ILLUSTRATION OF RAVI BEAS AND SUTLEJ RIVER BASINS

Abstract

Economics of water is certainly multifaceted. To each of its dimensions in turn,there exists a whole range of economic activities. The paper under reference would attempt to introduce one of such an area where various dimensions of the economics of water could be seen as alarmingly visible, i.e. the eastern component of the world-famous Indus Basin, which was virtually detached from the western part because of a water treaty signed amongst the two neighboring states. The eastern part of the basin includes the rivers Sutlej, Beas and Ravi, as well as their tributaries, and western part includes rivers Indus, Jhelum and Chenab along with their tributaries. For discussion on the detrimental effects of hydraulic constructions in upper catchments of both the eastern and western sides of the basin, the pre-treaty and post-treaty scenarios were required to be taken into consideration. The findings reveal that the construction of dams on the upper catchments eventually turned out to be the cause of a severe decline in the river flows. The dam construction on the eastern rivers in particularseriously deteriorated the total environment of the eastern side of the basin as the water compensation through the link canals did not matcheven a part of an earlier flow pattern.The western side, however, asking for entirely a different approach, has not been made a part of this study.