Blood and Water: The Indus River Basin in Modern History

377 Pages·2015·6.492 MB·English

by  David Gilmartin

Blood and Water
Th e publisher gratefully acknowledges the generous support
of the Asian Studies Endowment Fund
of the University of California Press Foundation.
Blood and Water
Th e Indus River Basin in Modern History
David Gilmartin
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gilmartin, David, 1949– author.
Blood and water : the Indus River Basin in modern history / David
Gilmartin.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-0-520-28529-3 (cloth)
isbn 978-0-520-96083-1 (ebook)
1. Irrigation—Indus River Valley—History. 2. Irrigation—Political
aspects—Indus River Valley. 3. Agriculture and state—Indus River
Valley. 4. Indus River Region—History. 5. Indus River Valley—
Environmental conditions. I. Title.
HD1741.I42I534 2015
333.91’62095491—dc23
2014047155
Manufactured in the United States of America
24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
In keeping with a commitment to support environmentally responsible and
sustainable printing practices, UC Press has printed this book on Natures
Natural, a fi ber that contains 30% post-consumer waste and meets the
minimum requirements of ansi/niso z39.48–1992 (r 1997) (Permanence
of Paper).
For Sandy

contents
Acknowledgments ix
Maps xi
1 INTRODUCTION: COMMUNITY AND ENVIRONMENT 1
Debating the Politics of Nature’s Transformation 2
Th e Setting: Th e Indus Basin 14
2 IRRIGATION AND THE BALOCH FRONTIER 27
Water, Pastoralism, and Baloch Identity 28
British Irrigation and the Myth of the Baloch Frontier 40
Empire, Irrigation, and Tribal Identity 62
3 COMMUNITY ON THE WASTE: THE VILLAGE AND
THE COLONIAL PROPERTY ORDER 69
Property, Individual, and Community 71
Community on the Waste: Commons, Aridity, Pastoralism 80
“A Local Habitation and a Name”: Territory and Taxation 96
viii contents
4 STATUTE AND CUSTOM IN WATER LAW 104
Statute and Individual Productivity 105
Th e Dilemmas of “Custom” in Water Management 112
Water Lords 126
5 SCIENCE, THE STATE, AND THE ENVIRONMENT 144
Engineers and Water Control 145
Wastelands, Canals, and State Power 156
Visions of Environment/Visions of Community 167
6 THE RIVER BASIN AND PARTITION 182
A System of Many Parts 184
Nationalism, Water, and the Partition of the Indus Basin 198
7 THE INDUS WATERS TREATY AND ITS AFTERLIVES 220
Th e River Basin Idea and Provincial Politics 221
Statecraft and Local Community in an Evolving System 235
Notes 253
Bibliography 321
Index 339
acknowledgments
Adequately acknowledging the help that I have received on this project is an impos-
sible task. Scholarship is inherently an interactive enterprise, with ideas shaped in
innumerable conversations (both in person and in print). But beyond that, it is
particularly diffi cult because this is a book with a long history and multiple lives. A
good part of the research was done many years back (and appeared in a number of
published articles). Th en I set the project aside while pursuing other avenues of
research. In the past several years I have returned to the project, adding parts to it,
bringing the research up to date, and reformulating it into (I hope) a coherent
book. But having presented diff ering aspects of the work in diff erent forms at many
scholarly workshops and conferences, and having gotten signifi cant feedback from
scholars and friends at many stages, it is diffi cult to give anywhere near adequate
acknowledgment to the many people who have helped me along the way.
I have received critical support for the research and writing of this book from a
number of granting agencies. Support for research in India and Pakistan, respec-
tively, has been supported by the American Institute of Indian Studies and by Ful-
bright. Th e American Institute for Pakistan Studies has helped to fund my return
to Pakistan to present work at conferences and workshops there. While writing the
book, I have been fortunate to have fellowships from the National Endowment for
the Humanities, the Woodrow Wilson Center, the National Humanities Center,
and the Stanford Humanities Center.
I want particularly to thank the staff s of the various archives in which I conducted
research, in Pakistan (Punjab Archives, Punjab Board of Revenue Record Room,
and Punjab Public Works Secretariat, Irrigation Branch, Record Room in Lahore)
and in India (National Archives, Delhi and Maharashtra State Archives, Mumbai, for
ix