Location and Project Features
The Kishenganga Hydroelectric Project (KHEP) is a 330 MW run-of-river hydroelectric project located in Bandipora district of Jammu and Kashmir.
It is built on the Kishenganga River, known as the Neelum River in Pakistan-administered Kashmir, which is a tributary of the Jhelum River.
The project is operated by NHPC Limited.
Its central engineering feature is the diversion of water from the Kishenganga River through a tunnel towards the Bonar-Madmati Nallah, ultimately joining the Jhelum system, to generate electricity.
The project was commissioned in 2018.
It is strategically important because it combines:
- hydropower generation;
- utilisation of India’s rights over western rivers under the Indus Waters Treaty;
- infrastructure development in Jammu and Kashmir;
- India-Pakistan transboundary water politics.
Link with the Indus Waters Treaty
Under the Indus Waters Treaty, 1960, brokered by the World Bank:
- Eastern Rivers — Ravi, Beas and Sutlej — were allocated largely for India’s unrestricted use.
- Western Rivers — Indus, Jhelum and Chenab — were allocated primarily for Pakistan, while India retained specified rights for domestic use, irrigation and hydroelectric generation.
Kishenganga lies within the Jhelum river system, a western river system.
India is therefore permitted to construct run-of-river hydroelectric plants subject to technical conditions contained particularly in Annexure D of the Treaty.
The dispute did not arise simply because India was generating hydroelectricity. Pakistan objected primarily to the design and diversion of water, arguing that these could adversely affect downstream flows and Pakistan’s own Neelum-Jhelum Hydropower Project.
Kishenganga Arbitration
Pakistan invoked the Indus Waters Treaty’s dispute-resolution mechanism, resulting in the constitution of a Court of Arbitration in 2010.
Two major questions emerged.
Inter-tributary diversion
Pakistan argued that India could not divert Kishenganga water from one tributary of the Jhelum system to another.
In its 2013 Final Award, the Court permitted India to divert water for hydroelectric generation.
However, India was required to maintain a minimum downstream flow of 9 cubic metres per second (cumecs) in the Kishenganga River to protect Pakistan’s downstream uses and environmental interests.
This was significant because it recognised India’s right to undertake the project while simultaneously imposing an environmental flow obligation.
Drawdown flushing
India proposed lowering the reservoir below dead storage level periodically to flush accumulated sediment.
The Court restricted such drawdown flushing, holding that reservoir levels could not ordinarily be reduced below dead storage level except in circumstances permitted by the Treaty.
This interpretation subsequently became important for other India-Pakistan hydropower disputes.
Wider Kishenganga-Ratle Dispute
Pakistan later raised objections to the design of both the Kishenganga and Ratle Hydroelectric Projects, involving issues such as:
- pondage;
- spillway configuration;
- turbine intakes;
- outlet levels;
- operational control over water.
India sought resolution through a Neutral Expert, viewing these largely as technical differences.
Pakistan sought a Court of Arbitration.
In 2022, the World Bank facilitated the appointment of both mechanisms:
- a Neutral Expert;
- a separate Court of Arbitration.
India objected to parallel proceedings, arguing that simultaneous mechanisms were inconsistent with the graded dispute-resolution structure of the Indus Waters Treaty.
India therefore has not recognised the legitimacy of the current Court of Arbitration proceedings, while participating in the Neutral Expert process.
Current Position, 2025–26
- The legal and geopolitical context changed substantially after the Pahalgam terrorist attack of April 2025, following which India announced that the Indus Waters Treaty would be held in abeyance until Pakistan credibly and irrevocably ended support for cross-border terrorism.
- The Court of Arbitration nevertheless continued its proceedings.
- In August 2025, it issued an award interpreting several technical provisions governing Indian run-of-river projects on the western rivers.
- In May 2026, it issued a supplemental award dealing with maximum pondage, including questions relevant to Kishenganga and Ratle. The Court held that pondage must be justified by genuine hydrological, hydraulic and operational requirements rather than merely by the installed generating capacity claimed for a project.
- On 31 August 2026, the Court of Arbitration further held that India’s decision to place the Treaty in abeyance did not, in its view, legally suspend or terminate the Treaty. It maintained that the Treaty continued to apply to Indian hydroelectric projects on the western rivers.
India has rejected these pronouncements, maintaining that the Court of Arbitration is illegally constituted and lacks jurisdiction, and that its decisions have no legal effect on India’s sovereign decision to hold the Treaty in abeyance.
Thus, the contemporary dispute now operates at two levels:
- the original technical dispute over hydropower design and water control;
- a broader legal and geopolitical dispute over the continuing status and interpretation of the Indus Waters Treaty itself.
Strategic and Environmental Significance
Kishenganga demonstrates an important feature of transboundary river governance: a hydropower project can comply with the broad allocation of water yet still generate disputes over how much operational control an upstream state can exercise.
For India, the project is important for:
- exploiting permitted hydropower potential on western rivers;
- strengthening energy security in Jammu and Kashmir;
- asserting treaty-based developmental rights;
- reducing underutilisation of India’s permissible share of the Indus system.
For Pakistan, concerns centre on:
- downstream flow;
- timing of water releases;
- reservoir storage and pondage;
- cumulative effect of multiple Indian projects;
- implications for irrigation and hydropower generation downstream.
Environmentally, the 2013 minimum-flow requirement was significant because it introduced an explicit ecological flow constraint into the operation of a transboundary hydropower project.
The Kishenganga case is therefore important not merely as an India-Pakistan dispute, but as a case study in the interaction of hydropower development, treaty interpretation, environmental flows, upstream-downstream rights and international dispute settlement.
