Islamabad, Feb 15 (IANS) Pakistan Thursday termed a World Bank-appointed neutral expert's verdict on the Baglihar hydropower project in India's Jammu and Kashmir as a "major victory" and added that it will not allow India to control shared water resources, Online news agency reported.
In a policy statement in the National Assembly, Federal Minister for Water and Power Liaqat Jatoi said the expert's ruling on the Baghliar dam was a major victory for Pakistan.
On Monday, Raymond Lafitte, a Swiss national and professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, handed over his final report on the project to Indian and Pakistani diplomats in Berne, Switzerland.
According to the verdict, India will now have to reduce the dam's height, originally proposed to be 144.5 metres, by one and a half metres.
Lafitte, the neutral expert appointed since the two neighbours signed the Indus Waters Treaty in 1960, was selected by the World Bank - the third party in the treaty - on April 20, 2005 to resolve differences between India and Pakistan over the Baglihar project.
Pakistan had opposed the hydroelectric project on the ground that it will divert water away from its territory and approached the World Bank Jan 15, 2005.
Jatoi said that Pakistan took the matter to the World Bank after several rounds of talks with India on this issue for 12 years had failed.
He said the neutral expert asked India to change its design of the dam and also that the free board regarding level of the stored water should be reduced to 3 metres from 4.4 metres.
"It is a major victory for us and has made Pakistan's case stronger. With this decision, the control of the water would not rest with India," Jatoi said.
India too has interpreted the expert's verdict to claim victory. "The neutral expert's Final Determination confirms that India's design has been compliant with the basic principles of the Indus Waters Treaty," India's ministry of water resources has said.
Jatoi said: "We also have objections on the Kishan Ganga Dam and India has now not only changed its design but also stopped the construction work, which is another victory."