The Pakistan Peoples Party held demonstrations across all district headquarters of Sindh on Saturday, following a call by party chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari to protest what PPP is calling India’s “water aggression” — the unilateral suspension of the Indus Waters Treaty that India announced in the aftermath of the Pahalgam terrorist attack in April 2025 (The Nation; APP).
PPP Sindh President Nisar Khuhro described India’s move as a violation of an international agreement that cannot be unilaterally suspended or terminated by either party, and said the party would continue demonstrating until international pressure forces India to restore treaty compliance. The Punjab Assembly passed a separate resolution on July 11 condemning India’s water diversion activities.
India’s position is that the treaty can be put in abeyance given the security context following the Pahalgam attack, which killed 26 tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir. Pakistan has denied state involvement in the attack and challenged the legal basis for India’s treaty suspension, filing a case at the Permanent Court of Arbitration.
Escalating language
Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Asif recently signalled a shift in tone, stating that Pakistan “would not hesitate to go to war” if its water security were breached — language that goes further than Pakistan’s previous diplomatic posture on the issue (The Diplomat). The statement was widely covered internationally as an escalation signal, though it remains within the range of declaratory rhetoric Pakistan has used in similar moments rather than a statement of operational intent.
The Indus Waters Treaty governs the allocation of the Indus river system between India and Pakistan. India controls the eastern rivers (Ravi, Beas, Sutlej); Pakistan has rights to the western rivers (Indus, Jhelum, Chenab). India’s upstream position gives it structural leverage; the treaty was designed to constrain that leverage through a binding international arrangement. Its suspension — even if legally contested — signals to Pakistan that the framework it has relied on for 65 years is no longer guaranteed.
Sindh, as the downstream province where all the rivers converge before reaching the sea, faces the most direct exposure to any reduction in flows.
