Catastrophic monsoon floods have once again battered South Asia, leaving a trail of devastation in both Pakistan and India, and triggering a fresh round of political recriminations between the two nuclear-armed neighbors. Since late June 2025, relentless rains have submerged vast swathes of Pakistan’s north and central regions—especially its populous Punjab province—drowning farmland, submerging villages, and displacing millions. According to Al Jazeera, at least 884 people have died in Pakistan, with over 220 fatalities in Punjab alone. Meanwhile, the deluge has not spared India either: its northern states, including Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and Indian Punjab, have also suffered widespread flooding, with more than 100 deaths reported and over 30 in Indian Punjab.
Despite this shared suffering, the floods have only deepened the rift between Islamabad and New Delhi. In late August, Pakistan’s federal minister Ahsan Iqbal accused India of weaponizing water by deliberately releasing excess flows from upstream dams on the Ravi, Sutlej, and Chenab rivers—vital arteries that originate in India and flow into Pakistan. Iqbal called the alleged releases “the worst example of water aggression,” warning that such actions threatened lives, property, and livelihoods. “India has started using water as a weapon and has caused wide-scale flooding in Punjab,” Iqbal declared, as reported by Al Jazeera. He added, “Some issues should be beyond politics, and water cooperation must be one of them.”
These accusations come against a backdrop of escalating hostilities. Relations between India and Pakistan, already at historic lows, plunged further after the deadly Pahalgam attack in April, in which gunmen killed 26 civilians in Indian-administered Kashmir. India blamed Pakistan for the attack and, in a dramatic move, walked out of the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT)—a six-decade-old pact that had governed the sharing of the Indus Basin’s six rivers. The fallout was immediate: in May, the two rivals engaged in a four-day military conflict, targeting each other’s bases with missiles and drones, marking their gravest escalation in nearly thirty years.
The IWT, signed in 1960, had provided a framework for cooperation and data sharing on water flows. Under the treaty, India controls the three eastern rivers (Ravi, Sutlej, and Beas), while Pakistan controls the three western rivers (Jhelum, Chenab, and Indus). India is obligated to allow the western rivers to flow into Pakistan, with only limited exceptions, and to provide timely hydrological data. But with India’s withdrawal, fears have mounted in Pakistan that New Delhi could either choke off water supplies or unleash sudden, devastating floods through unannounced dam releases.
India’s Home Minister Amit Shah, in June, made it clear that the treaty would not be restored, a stance that has fueled protests in Pakistan and accusations of “water terrorism.” Yet, while the Indian government has not formally responded to the latest allegations, the Indian High Commission in Islamabad has, in recent weeks, issued several warnings of possible cross-border flooding “on humanitarian grounds.”
But is India truly to blame for Pakistan’s misery? Experts on both sides urge caution. Daanish Mustafa, a professor of critical geography at King’s College London, told Al Jazeera, “The Indian decision to release water from their dam has not caused flooding in Pakistan.” He explained that major dams on India’s side—including Salal and Baglihar on the Chenab, Pong on the Beas, Bhakra on the Sutlej, and Ranjit Sagar (Thein) on the Ravi—are designed with safety in mind. When their capacity is exceeded, controlled releases become necessary to prevent catastrophic dam failures. “The parameters used to build the dams are now obsolete and meaningless,” Mustafa said, pointing to the impact of climate change, which has dramatically altered rainfall patterns and rendered old infrastructure calculations moot.
Indeed, both countries depend on Himalayan and Karakoram glaciers to feed their rivers. The Indus river basin, in particular, is Pakistan’s lifeline, supplying water to most of its 250 million people and underpinning its agriculture. This year, melting glaciers and an unusually intense monsoon pushed river levels on both sides of the border to breaking point. In India, surging flows put infrastructure at risk, while in Pakistan, glacial outbursts and torrential rains raised river levels to dangerous highs.
Controlled water releases, though fraught with risk, are a standard flood management practice. Shiraz Memon, a former Pakistani representative on the IWT commission, told Al Jazeera, “Instead of acknowledging that India has shared warnings, we are blaming them of water terrorism. It is [a] simple, natural flood phenomenon.” By the end of August, he noted, reservoirs across the region were full, and spillways had to be opened. “With water at capacity, spillways had to be opened for downstream releases. This is a natural solution as there is no other option available.”
Official data underscores the scale of the crisis. On September 3, India’s Central Water Commission reported at least a dozen sites facing “severe” flood situations, with 19 more above normal flood levels. The next day, Pakistan’s Meteorological Department warned that two sites on the Sutlej and Ravi rivers faced “extremely high” flood levels, while two others on the Ravi and Chenab saw “very high” levels. The sheer volume of water during such intense monsoons often overwhelms any single dam or barrage’s capacity.
Yet, the politics of blame continue to overshadow technical realities. Analysts caution that the finger-pointing serves short-term political interests on both sides. For India, suspending the treaty is framed as a tough response to alleged Pakistani support for terrorism. For Pakistan, blaming India offers a convenient scapegoat, distracting from domestic failures in flood preparedness and governance. As Mustafa put it, “Rivers are living, breathing entities. This is what they do; they are always on the move. You cannot control the flood, especially a high or severe flood.” He concluded that blaming India “won’t stop the floods. But it appears to be an easy way out to relinquish responsibility.”
These tensions are not going unnoticed by the international community. On September 4, former US officials from the Biden administration, including Jake Sullivan and Kurt Campbell, published an article in Foreign Affairs Magazine urging the Trump administration to deepen ties with India, calling it “one of the United States’ most important global partners.” They warned that current strains risk “a split that would be difficult to mend” and advised Washington to draw India closer, not push it away. The relationship, they noted, has been “vulnerable to misunderstandings, missteps, and missed opportunities because of lingering distrust and misaligned expectations.”
Sullivan and Campbell recommended a 10-year strategic alliance between the US and India, focused on technology, defense, supply chains, intelligence, and global problem-solving—distinct from a traditional mutual defense pact. They emphasized that such an alliance “does not compromise India’s strategic autonomy or sovereignty,” insisting that “alliances are about alignment and common purpose—not about sacrificing sovereignty.”
Kurt Campbell, in an interview with PBS NewsHour, expressed deep concern about India’s trajectory, noting that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent moves signal that India “has other options” besides the US. The former officials also rebuked the idea of a “hyphenated” India-Pakistan policy, arguing that US interests regarding India’s future far outweigh those in Pakistan, except for counterterrorism and nonproliferation.
As South Asia grapples with unprecedented floods, the region’s leaders face a stark choice: continue the politics of blame and escalation, or embrace cooperation and shared solutions to climate and security challenges that recognize the rivers’ unpredictable power. The stakes—human, political, and environmental—have never been higher.
