“China’s mega dam being built near the Arunachal Pradesh border will be a ticking ‘water bomb’, an existential threat and a bigger issue than anything else apart from the military threat.” At a press briefing in New Delhi, Arunachal Pradesh Chief Minister Pema Khandu voiced a concern shared by many in India’s strategic community. His warning followed Beijing’s formal approval, on 25?December?2024, for a hydropower project on the lower Yarlung Tsangpo River in Tibet.

China insists the dam is a green initiative. Officials note that it aligns with national goals of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality, offering low-carbon energy while helping to mitigate climate change. Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun repeated this line at a press conference on 6?January: “the project would not harm downstream countries but rather aid them in disaster prevention and climate response, after rigorous scientific evaluation ensured no ecological or geological damage.”

India remains unconvinced. Khandu warned that, “if China were to release water suddenly, the entire Siang belt could be destroyed.” Assam’s Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sharma added that “the Brahmaputra ecosystem would become fragile and rely solely on rainwater from Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh.” Their anxiety reflects more than environmental fear; it speaks to deeper questions of power and vulnerability.

The Yarlung Tsangpo emerges from the foot of the Angsi Glacier on the Tibetan Plateau and flows eastward for over 1,700?km across Tibet. It carves some of the world’s deepest and highest canyons before making a dramatic U-turn at the Great Bend. From there, it enters Arunachal Pradesh as the Siang and, further downstream in Assam, becomes the Brahmaputra. In Hindu mythology, the river is one of the few male rivers—revered as the ‘Son of Brahma’—and carries a sacred identity that adds emotional weight to any attempt to control its flow.

In 2011, China’s Five-Year Plan invoked the idea of taming the Yarlung Tsangpo’s ‘djinn’ to harness strategic advantage. The proposal took concrete form in December?2024, when Beijing announced its commitment to this ambitious venture. Since then, despite protests and criticism, Chinese officials have maintained that the dam will protect lower riparian states rather than endanger them.

The real question, however, is what India might do if Beijing chose to use water as a tool of coercion. We have seen China assert pressure in Ladakh and Galwan and even rename areas in Arunachal Pradesh. What if China cut the water supply or released excess water to cause floods? Indian ministers have raised such scenarios before. Yet a military response against a far more powerful neighbor would carry prohibitive costs, and pragmatism may well prevail.

Prestige also shapes India’s stance. The Modi government’s narrative of India as a Vishwaguru—world teacher—cannot tolerate a perception of weakness. Washington and Quad partners have bolstered India’s regional role through LEMOA (2016), COMCASA (2018) and BECA (2020), all designed to balance China’s rise. If India appears unable to counter Beijing, Western confidence in Delhi’s leadership could wane, undermining a key pillar in the broader containment strategy.

Paradoxically, this mix of action and inaction places India in a difficult position. In the shadows of high-level diplomacy and technical reports, water data becomes a weapon. As strategic affairs expert Brahma Chellaney observes, “Even denial of hydrological data in a critically important season can amount to the use of water as a political tool.” Without reliable forecasts of when and how much water will flow, every monsoon becomes a security concern. In the absence of binding transparency, riparian dependence turns into strategic vulnerability.

Coercion need not involve sluice gates or large reservoirs. The prospect of sudden releases or stoppages loom as a symbol of hydro-hegemony. Game-theoretic studies on the Nile Basin suggest that the threat of manipulating flows can ratchet up mistrust and prompt a security dilemma between upstream and downstream states. The Brahmaputra Dam thus becomes more than concrete and turbines; it can become a gesture of power. When control of water becomes a question of prestige and strategy, the river ceases to be a simple resource and transforms into an instrument of statecraft.

Analysts at the Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences warn that even a ten?percent diversion from the Brahmaputra could have severe consequences downstream, predicting that “water wars” could break out between India and China. In plain sight, building a dam in such a strategic region gives China real leverage.

Yet India is not powerless. In mid-July?2025, New?Delhi signaled a shift in its China policy by sending External Affairs Minister S?Jaishankar to Beijing. Over two days, Jaishankar met Vice-President Han?Zheng and President?Xi?Jinping, stressing practical cooperation and fair engagement. Within days, India resumed issuing tourist visas to Chinese nationals, suspended since March?2020. These gestures indicate that, even under strategic pressure, New?Delhi remains willing to balance legal protests and firm rhetoric with measured diplomacy.

Meanwhile, India’s posture toward Pakistan over the Indus tells a different story. In the aftermath of attacks in Indian-administered Kashmir, India accused Pakistan of backing separatist groups and even suggested revisiting the Indus Waters Treaty. Such threats, though never acted upon, this reflects water as a power CHIP. Pakistan depends on the Indus for agriculture and water security; and the threat fuels anxiety.

The comparison is stark. India and Pakistan are bound by the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty, brokered by the World Bank, which obliges India to allow regulated flows of the western rivers—Indus, Jhelum and Chenab—to Pakistan. In contrast, China and India share no binding treaty over the Brahmaputra or its tributaries, only non-binding agreements to share hydrological data. This legal gap enables upstream states to build dams without fear of enforceable constraints.

India appears to have a two-pronged strategy. With Pakistan, it acts tough and domineering, while with China, it demands fairness and transparency, accusing Beijing of untrustworthiness. This inconsistency undermines India’s legitimacy in transboundary water politics and reveals the primacy of power over principle.

Realism defines this contest. Upstream powers leverage geography to enforce dependency and control narratives. Legal frameworks are honored when convenient and ignored when they hinder strategic aims. This selective approach to law echoes Stephen Krasner’s notion of sovereignty as organized hypocrisy, where power dictates principle rather than the reverse.

A new flashpoint in South Asia may emerge from water, not land. Beyond Kashmir and Tibet, the rivers themselves—Brahmaputra and Indus—carry the potential to escalate pressure into conflict. Time will tell, and time is often the truest witness to how power flows.

Mohammad Zain is a writer and researcher specializing in international relations, space governance, and strategic affairs. He holds degrees in English Literature and Linguistics as well as International Relations from the National University of Modern Languages (NUML), Islamabad. His work explores the intersection of emerging technologies, geopolitics, and political philosophy, with a focus on how technological shifts reshape global power structures and collective security frameworks. Zain has authored essays and op-eds on topics including space weaponization, US–Pakistan relations, and the evolving global security architecture. He also actively engages in academic discourse to make complex strategic issues accessible to a wider audience.