Description: India has raised grave concerns over the announced development of the Chinese mega Dam on the transborder Yarlung Zangbo river which is known as Brahmaputra in India. The development of the dam has raised national security concerns over Chinese predominance on the waterflow of the river which is expected to start generating power by the early to mid-2030s with project costs of about $170 billion. India, ever since the start of the project, has launched an initiative to build its own river dam in the northeastern parts of the country, however various other issues have emerged in the meantime. Opposition from the local population, the sheer location of the dams has also raised concerns over the high degree of seismologic activity in the region and the weaponization of the water supply, which remained India’s main concerns. China announced the commencement of development activities in recent months and is expected to finish the dam by 2030. India’s Foreign Minister, Subrahmanyam Jaishankar has reportedly raised these concerns with China’s Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, in their recent visit where the regional strategic rivals resolved a long-standing dispute and pledged closer strategic cooperation.
Impact: China and India have recently mended bilateral ties exploiting India’s strategic rift with the US over the country’s oil imports from Russia. The meeting where the foreign ministers signaled diplomatic reconciliation could be expediently overshadowed by emerging bilateral disputes such as the development of the mega dam which is expected to be finished in 2030. Both countries are currently pursuing independent projects regarding the river which indicates immediate deterioration in bilateral ties, however, the establishment of some sort of a joint development project initiative remains as one of the likely possibilities. The dam enables China key access to a regional critical resource which could also impact the power dynamics in the region in Pakistan’s favor, as one of China’s most reliable regional partners. China and India would most likely resort to high level government coordination and joint development project initiatives regarding the dams in order to preserve the current stable ties which are expected to devise extensive cooperation in areas such as rare earth minerals exploitation and trade partnerships.