Agar firdaus bar roo-e zameen ast, Hameen ast-o hameen ast-o hameen ast. “If there is a paradise on earth, It is this, it is this, it is this” ~ Amir Khusrau

Few have described Kashmir more beautifully than Indo-Persian Sufi poet Khusrau ~ a place which was converted into a graveyard on 22 April 2025. This backdrop has led to the suspension of the Indus Water Treaty (IWT) as India retaliates ~ albeit diplomatically.

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Apart from its water consequences on Pakistan, it raises a far more important question: Whether India could have done this, in the first place. Accordingly, I argue that India walks a fine line ~ where arguments galore both for and against exist ~ while clarifying certain misconceptions that have crept in. The IWT needs no separate introduction. For 64 years the treaty has been at the forefront of Indo-Pak diplomacy and tug of war. Previously, Pakistan has invoked IWT’s dispute settlement provision (Article IX) birth ing two arbitrations. The first resulted in an award by the PCA in 2013. The latter is still pending (Pakistan v. India, PCA Case No. 2023-01) and has uniquely re – sulted in a ‘parallel’ proceeding in which both the PCA and the neutral expert have asserted competence and jurisdiction. The Pahalgam attacks have now compelled India to annou – nce the immediate ‘abeyance’ of IWT followed by the official notification. This raises a fundamental question, can India do so? It is interesting to note that India in its official announcement uses the phrase ‘abeyance’ with immediate effect instead of ‘suspension’ or ‘termination’. The........

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