LAHORE: A delegation of water officials headed by Pakistan’s Indus Water Commissioner Mehar Ali Shah left on Sunday for a four-day visit to India inspect 1,000MW Pakal Dul and 48MW Lower Kalnai hydro-electric projects on the River Chenab.
Indian officials have also expressed positive signs with regard to inspection by Pakistani officials about other projects on Chenab, according to reports.
A delegation of nine officials led by Indian Water Commissioner Pradeep Kumar Saxena visited Pakistan in August last year for talks pertaining to water issues.
The water commissioners of the neighboring countries are required to meet twice a year and arrange technical visits to sites of projects and critical river headworks.
India had originally agreed to allow Pakistani experts to inspect the aforementioned two projects during the 115th meeting of the Permanent Commission for Indus Waters (PCIW) held between the two countries from August 29 to 30 in Lahore last year.
Besides agreeing to an inspection of the Pakal Dul and Lower Kalnal projects, which was scheduled for September, India had also consented to a survey by Pakistani experts of the Kishanganga project at Jhelum basin at a later stage. Reciprocally, Pakistan had agreed to allow India to carry outan inspection of Kotri Barrage over the Indus after September.
After initially scheduling the inspection of the projects at Chenab Basin by Pakistani experts from October 7 to 11, New Delhi had postponed the same on the pretext of local bodies’ elections in the respective areas.
After a reminder in November, Islamabad had on December 24 once again urged India through a letter to fulfill the commitment it made in August to schedule the hydropower projects’ inspection by Pakistani experts.
