International and National Perspectives on Water Resources Law

Instructor – Dr. Tony George Puthucherril

tgeorge@jgu.edu.in

The Context
As a transparent and unassuming universal solvent, apart from satisfying existential needs,
water is needed for agricultural, industrial, and transportation requirements rendering it
difficult, if not practically impossible, to articulate in precise terms the centrality and
criticality of water in our lives. Despite this, most of us take this unique gift of nature for
granted, misusing it to the point that it has now become the most defiled of all the natural
resources. As long as water flows out from one of our faucets in an unadulterated form and is
not conspicuously objectionable, we give very little thought to where the water comes from,
how it is brought into our homes, or what impact can water scarcity has on our lives.
However, freshwater, which is quintessential to life, constitutes only two percent of the
earth’s total water supply. Furthermore, even the lion’s share of this is locked up in the
masses of ice caps, glaciers, and clouds, leaving only a tiny fraction to satiate our thirst and
other water demands. It is against this finite and set quantity of water to which nothing is
added to or deducted, that one has to juxtapose the increasing demands of an ever-growing
population, economic development, and urbanization.

At this juncture, it is necessary to highlight certain other facets of water that renders its
management daunting – first, the distribution of water is skewed, and its availability is not
uniform. There are certain parts of the world where water is scarce, rendering these regions
prone to severe drought, while there are others where water is available aplenty and where
floods are a frequent recurrence imperilling lives and property. While water is a decisive
element in the economic growth of a nation and is at the core of sustainable development, it is
the same development that inflicts considerable stress on water. A legacy of unregulated and
profligate consumption, haphazard urbanization, unscientific irrigation practices, construction
of massive dams, inter-basin transfers, dumping of toxic substances, obliteration of forests
and degradation of wetlands, have irreparably damaged the earth’s surface water so severely
that now we mine the underground water at rates faster than what nature can replenish them.
This man-induced water scarcity pales in comparison when we consider the impacts of
another lethal disruptive phenomenon on water, namely, that of climate change, which is also
indisputably linked to human activity. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC), has explained the dynamics and has forecast some of the pervasive impacts of
climate change on the hydrological cycle. They explain that climate change is already leading
to a dramatic upsurge in average global temperatures, which can derail and render chaotic
precipitation patterns, and intensify glacier and icecap melt, thereby leading to frequent
droughts and floods. An upsurge in mean surface temperature coupled with variable
precipitation will lead to further evaporation of surface freshwater sources, which means that
more and more people will dig up the earth’s bowels to access an already stretched and
imperilled supply of groundwater. The indeterminate layers of uncertainty and risk which
climate change produces when juxtaposed against the ever-increasing water demands of a
growing population, water scarcity, and poor water quality will engender more conflict. The
ever-growing municipal, industrial, and agricultural water needs in a changing climate mean
that water resource management must necessarily be adaptable to these changing variables.
Despite considerable scientific and economic progress, the paradox is that universal access to
essential water, one of the fundamental conditions for human development, remains unmet.
Nearly two billion people at the global level are compelled to live parched lives. Freshwater
is a fast-disappearing resource, and countries are finding it hard-pressed to provide adequate
supplies to its citizens, and the global freshwater crisis looms as one of the greatest threats
ever to the very existence of life itself on the planet.

As far as the Republic of India is concerned, even though it accounts for only 2.45 percent of
the world’s total land area and 4 percent of the water resources, it houses nearly 17 percent of
the world’s population. India stands as an exemplar of this dichotomy, where due to the
imbalance between the core variables of land, water, and population, water management is a
primary and a daunting challenge. As well, water is distributed unevenly throughout the
Indian landmass over time and space. There are certain regions, particularly in the North-
Eastern parts, which are water surplus; in contrast, the arid North West and the Deccan is
plagued by recurring water scarcity. All this, coupled with climate change, erratic monsoons,
and poor water quality has resulted in a significant decline in the per-capita water availability
since 1951. If the per capita water availability in 2001 was 1,816 cubic meters, by 2010, it
drastically fell to 1,588 cubic meters. With India’s population expected to cross the 1.5
billion mark by the middle of this century, there will be a dramatic increase in water demand.
India will need about 1,650 billion cubic meters of water annually to avoid being a water-
starved country and about 2,800 billion cubic meters to be above the water-stressed zone.
Even allowing for the utilization of all the available water resources in the country, the total
water availability in 2050 would only be about 2,400 billion cubic meters. In other words,
India would be a water-stressed country, even if it were to utilize all its water.

Therefore, it is increasingly recognized that there must be judicious management of water and
in this to develop new management tools and approaches for sustainable water development
that Water Law assumes importance. Water law operates as one of the principal instruments
to ensure equitable distribution of this scarce resource among competing claimants as to
avoid conflict. Furthermore, Water Law helps restructure water use to secure its rational
conservation, sustainable development, and utilization in terms of quantity and quality,
seeking to mitigate the adverse impacts of a profligate past to ensure a comfortable and
sustainable future.
The primary objective of this course is to examine the importance of water law from
international and national perspectives as a management tool for conflict avoidance to secure
sustainable water resources development. Other objectives include -
1) To examine some of the contemporary challenges faced globally and in India in
relation to the management of water resources, particularly in terms of avoidance of
water conflicts
2) To analyse the salience of International Water Law and examine its influence over
India’s legal framework on water
3) To understand the constitutional basis for water governance, including the federal
relations in water management
4) To analyse the laws and policies relating to water, their suitability to respond to
contemporary challenges and crises
5) To examine the role of the judicial process and that of specialised water tribunals in
this regard
 6) To suggest legal and policy reforms where needed

Possible Topics
1) Understanding International Water Law (The Helsinki Rules, The Berlin Rules, and
the UN Watercourses Convention)
2) The Human Right to Water
3) Groundwater Management
4) Surface Water Management
5) Laws Relating to Irrigation
6) Water Disputes (International and National)