Pakistan has increasingly linked its water insecurity to India and the Indus Waters Treaty. The latest dispute came after the Court of Arbitration at The Hague ruled on aspects of the treaty on August 31. India placed the IWT in abeyance on April 22, 2025 after the massacre of Indian civilians in Pulwama, Jammu and Kashmir. 

‘Blood and water will not flow together,” Prime Minister Modi said on August 15, 2025 in his Independence Day speech from the Red Fort, New Delhi, emphasising India’s response to the Pahalgam attack and Pakistan’s sponsorship of terror. Water sharing continues, only institutional mechanisms for cooperation and information exchange have been put on hold.

The IWT signed in 1960 gives Pakistan 80% of the river flows of the Indus rivers Indus, Chenab and Jhelum, while allocating the three Eastern Rivers, Ravi, Beas and Sutlej, to India. But beyond the IWT dispute lies a deeper problem: Pakistan was one of the world’s most water-stressed countries even before the IWT was held in abeyance – it has just 30 to 60 days of water storage capacity, as opposed to at least twice as much. (India has around 200 days of water storage; the United States has over 900 days).

Pakistan’s main river, the Indus, sees 80 per cent of its flow in just 92 days of the year— during the monsoons, between June and August. Because Pakistan has yet to build the infrastructure, it cannot store the water. Pakistan, the world’s fifth most populous country has just 139 large dams. Just one Indian state, Gujarat, has 620 large dams.  

The water crisis is compounded by Pakistan economic mess—the economy is growing at 2 per cent, inflation is over 11 per cent, and a debt-to-GDP ratio touched nearly 70 per cent. The state relies on IMF bailouts for support, like the latest tranche, 7 billion dollars, in 2024. Yet, Islamabad continues to prioritise its military, above everything else. Pakistan is the world’s fifth largest arms importer. The Stockholm Institute of Peace Research (SIPRI) says Islamabad’s arms imports rose 66% between 2021 and 2025 and defence allocation rose about 18% to $10.8 Billion in FY 2026-27. 

In the 2026 budget, Islamabad allocated $10 billion for defence, but just $270 million to the water sector. Just two Hangor-class submarines which Pakistan imported from China this year, could build a major dam like Mohmand. 

Pakistan’s 139 dams is a significantly small large-dam inventory for a country of more than 250 million people facing growing water demand. Its three principal reservoirs, Tarbela, Mangla and Chashma, provide only about 13.17 MAF of live storage. Much of Pakistan’s water therefore remains exposed to seasonal variation, leaving people to rely increasingly on groundwater for the remaining months of the year.

The population pressure is only set to increase, further stressing its water requirements. Pakistan had a population of around 255.2 million in 2025 and is growing at approximately 1.58% annually. Its population could reach between 370-400 million by 2050 and around 467 million by 2075. Such growth will sharply increase demand for drinking water, food, irrigation, electricity and urban infrastructure. Studies estimate that Pakistan would be a severely water-scarce country in about one or two decades from now. 

A growing population will place even greater pressure on an already stretched system, while climate variability could make the management of seasonal flows more difficult. Pakistan's water crisis it is rooted in decades of domestic infrastructure and resource-management challenges. Blaming India coupled with intense rhetoric on defence spending only explains Pakistan diverting its population’s attention from public welfare concerns. For a country facing growing water stress, building dams, modernising irrigation and improving water management must become a strategic priority. It is unfortunately, not the case. The ‘hard state’ that its de-facto military ruler Field Marshal Asim Munir declared earlier this year, is determined to rob the civilian Peter to pay the military Paul. 

Savio Rodrigues

Savio Rodrigues is a Research Analyst at Escape Velocity MediaWorks Pvt Ltd and writes for Chakra News on Defence, Geopolitics, National Security. He holds a Master’s degree in International Relations from the University of Mumbai.