Refugee rehabilitation and transboundary cooperation: India, Pakistan, and the Indus River system

At independence, in 1947, India and Pakistan experienced widespread communal violence, with the worst occurring in eastern and western Punjab.1 As the states were engulfed in a war over Kashmir, people crossed the new border that now divided Punjab in an attempt to escape the bloodshed. To settle and rehabilitate the millions of refugees that entered eastern Punjab, India used the waters of the Indus River tributaries to establish an agrarian economy. India also employed refugees to build the hydrological infrastructure, including dams, canals, and irrigation networks, needed to support an agriculture-based economy. These policies also helped meet India’s need to develop a border province threatened by the Indo-Pakistani conflict and to produce desperately needed grain to avert famine.