Teesta water agreement hits choppy waters

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There will be no agreement on the sharing of the Teesta river waters without the consultation of the West Bengal government, Foreign Secretary Ranjan Mathai said on Monday, a day ahead of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's two-day visit to Dhaka.

"Nothing is done and nothing will be done without the consultation with the state government," Mathai told reporters. West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has refused to accompany the prime minister to Dhaka to protest the final draft of the Teesta river water sharing agreement with Bangladesh.

The Teesta, which begins its journey in Sikkim, flows through north Bengal before entering Bangladesh.

Banerjee's unhappiness stemmed from the amount of water sharing of the Teesta mentioned in the final draft of the agreement that was slated to be signed during the September 6-7 visit of the prime minister.

"There was difference between the initial draft of the agreement and the final version. The state government had agreed on sharing of up to 25,000 cusecs. But the final version talks of sharing 33,000-50,000 cusecs," a source close to Banerjee had said in Kolkata.

"She feels this will hurt West Bengal's interests," the source said.

The other river on the India-Bangladesh discussion table is the Feni.

The Feni, which flows 135 km south of Tripura capital Agartala, has been in dispute since 1934. In a total catchment area of 1,147 square km of the river, 535 square km falls in India and the rest in Bangladesh.

On the Feni river, Mathai said that things were as per plan.

Manmohan Singh will now be accompanied by the chief ministers of Assam, Tripura, Meghalaya and Mizoram on the trip that comes four decades after the India-Pakistan war had led to the birth of Bangladesh.