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New Delhi: BJP President JP Nadda on Monday attacked former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru over the Indus Water Treaty with Pakistan, which India has suspended since the Pahalgam terror attack and Operation Sindoor.
Taking to X, Nadda blamed India's first PM Nehru for the treaty and said, "The Indus Water Treaty, 1960, was one of the biggest blunders of former PM Jawaharlal Nehru that kept national interest at the altar of personal ambitions."
He added, "The nation must know that when former Pandit Nehru signed the Indus Waters Treaty with Pakistan, he unilaterally handed over 80 per cent of Indus basin waters to Pakistan, leaving India with just 20 per cent of the share. It was a decision that permanently compromised India’s water security and national interest."
Nadda levelled further allegations against Nehru and said, "The most appalling aspect was that he did it without consulting the Indian Parliament. The treaty was signed in September 1960. However, it was placed before Parliament only two months later, in November, and, that too, for a token discussion of mere 2 hours!"
Nadda claimed that Nehru's move was opposed by MPs from Congress and even showed a clipping from an article. He said, "It was such a monumental blunder that even Pandit Nehru’s own party MPs vehemently opposed it. He yielded far too much, receiving nothing in return. Congress’s Asoka Mehta slammed the treaty and called it akin to a ‘second partition’ for the country. His words expressed the grief and shock felt not only within his own party but also across the opposition and the nation on Nehru’s complete surrender."
He also mentioned another Congress MP, Arun Chandra Guha's criticism of Nehru. Nadda alleged that Guha slammed the former PM for "paying Rs 83 crore in sterling to Pakistan when India faced a foreign exchange crisis. He cited it as the height of folly.” He also alleged that Guha warned about Nehru bypassing the Parliament, terming it as "the attitude of a totalitarian government”.
Nadda also claimed that former PM Atal Bihari Vajpayee, then a young MP, attacked Nehru’s Indus Water Treaty. He wrote that Vajpayee "warned that the Prime Minister’s argument, that succumbing to Pakistan’s unreasonable demands would establish friendship and goodwill, was flawed. True friendship, he argued, cannot be built on injustice. If opposing Pakistan’s unfair demands led to strained relations, then so be it!"
He also called Nehru's arguments in defence of the Indus Water Treaty faulty, and the former PM reportedly asked, “Partition of what? A pailful of water?” and criticised "the opinions of fellow parliamentarians who spoke for the national interest as being too “narrow.”
Nadda called the treaty Nehru's 'Himalayan Blunder' and added, "India would have continued to pay the price for one man’s misplaced idealism, if not for Prime Minister Modi’s bold leadership and his commitment to ‘Nation First’. By putting the Indus Water Treaty in abeyance, PM Modi has corrected yet another grave historical wrong committed by Congress!"
