India will keep raising the issue of river Brahmaputra and contamination of its waters with the Chinese authorities.
Informing this, Union External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj in a written reply to Ramen Deka, BJP MP from Mangaldai in Assam stated, “Let me assure you that we will remain engaged with China on the issue of trans-border rivers to safeguard our interests, including through the expert level mechanism.”
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The matter was earlier raised by Deka under Rule 377 in Lok Sabha.
“We fully appreciate your concern in this regard. Considering its importance, I personally raised the issue with the Chinese Foreign Minister during his recent visit to India in December 2017…the Chinese Foreign Ministry as well as the Chinese embassy based in New Delhi have stated that the situation (contamination) was caused by an earthquake in the region and was not a man made incident,” Swaraj further stated in her written reply to Mangaldai MP Deka.
The Central government has been in close cooperation with various State governments which are users of the waters of Brahmaputra river and continues to carefully monitor the water flow in the mighty river for early detection of abnormality so that corrective and preventive measures are taken to safeguard livelihood of peoples of these States.
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“As a lower riparian state with considerable established user rights to the waters of the trans-border rivers, we have consistently conveyed our views and concerns to the Chinese authorities including at the highest levels and have urged them to ensure that the interests of downstream states are not harmed by any activities in upstream areas,” Union Minister Swaraj informed.
“Various issues relating to trans-border rivers are discussed with China under the ambit of India-China Expert Level Mechanism which was established in 2006,” the Union Minister added.