WATER POLICY AND GOVERNANCE FOR THE EMPOWERMENT OF RIVER BASIN COMMUNITIES IN RURAL BANGLADESH by Mohammad Anwar Hossen M.S.S., University of Dhaka, 1994 M.A., Carleton University, 2008 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF Doctor of Philosophy in THE COLLEGE OF GRADUATE STUDIES Interdisciplinary Studies THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Okanagan) September 2014 © Mohammad Anwar Hossen, 2014 Abstract Agricultural communities in the Ganges Dependent Area of Bangladesh are facing extreme hardships due to current water management practices, environmental degradation, and agricultural modernization programs that benefit the elite but disadvantage the majority. India is a major contributor to these problems because of its diversion of large amounts of water from the Ganges River before it reaches Bangladesh. The governance systems within both Bangladesh and India are best understood as ecocracies, that is, highly centralized and bureaucratic systems in which resources are controlled by elite groups following neoliberal development goals. This style of governance has marginalized the majority of farming households who now find themselves unable to make their voices heard. The hardships they are now facing are severe enough to be classified as human rights violations. In this study I describe the effects of regional hydropolitics on water management, focusing on three large engineering projects, the Farakka Barrage built by India on the Ganges River, and the Ganges-Kobodak Gorai River Restoration Projects in Bangladesh. I also describe the traditional livelihood strategies and local ecological knowledge of farming households in the community of Chapra, Kushtia District, Bangladesh, and the rapid displacement of traditional practices by a commoditized system created through government intervention. I gathered information about local knowledge and farming practices during a year of fieldwork in 2011-12, through focus group discussions, in-depth case studies of four farming households and a survey in which 259 households participated. In addition to this primary data, I collected extensive secondary documents from the government of Bangladesh pertaining to water management, agricultural modernization and institutional structures. ii My field data reveals that the right to water of the vast majority of Chapra farming households, as defined by United Nations Conventions and international customary law, is being systematically violated and that this violation in turn has led to multiple human rights violations in the areas of employment, food, education, health care and housing. I conclude with recommendations for how these problems could be solved through application of human rights principles and greater community inclusion in governance processes at international, national, and local levels. iii Preface This research project was approved by the Behavioral Research Ethics Board (BREB) of the University of British Columbia (Okanagan Campus), Certificate H11-01129. I am solely responsible for the design and conduct of the research project, the analysis of the data and the writing of this dissertation. Content from chapter one on hydropolitics has been published as Bilateral Hydro- hegemony in the Ganges-Brahmaputra Basin Oriental Geographer 53 (1 & 2) 2012. The organization and wording of the published article is significantly different, however, from the comparable sections of chapter one. I included content from my concluding chapter in a conference paper presented at the City University of Hong Kong with the title of “The Ganges Basin Management Review for Community Empowerment” on 20-21 May 2014. This conference paper has been accepted for publication in the Springer Journal Bandung: Journal of the Global South. The wording and content is not identical, however, to the concluding chapter. iv Table of Contents Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... ii Preface ........................................................................................................................................... iv Table of Contents .......................................................................................................................... v List of Tables ................................................................................................................................ ix List of Figures ............................................................................................................................... xi Glossary of Bengali Terms ......................................................................................................... xii List of Acronyms ....................................................................................................................... xvii Acknowledgements .................................................................................................................... xix CHAPTER One: Introduction .................................................................................................... 1 The Research Question ..................................................................................................... 3 Ecological Characteristics of the Ganges Basin ............................................................... 4 Hydropolitics in South Asia .............................................................................................. 7 Hydropolitics in Bangladesh ........................................................................................... 10 Theoretical Approach ..................................................................................................... 11 Development Theory ............................................................................................. 11 Political Ecology ................................................................................................... 16 Human Rights ........................................................................................................ 18 Water Governance ................................................................................................. 21 Organization of the dissertation ...................................................................................... 23 CHAPTER Two: Research Methodology ............................................................................... 26 Method of Data Collection ............................................................................................. 33 Primary Data Collection ................................................................................................. 35 Focus Groups ......................................................................................................... 35 In-Depth Case Studies and Participant Observation ............................................. 39 Tanvir ................................................................................................................ 40 Tofajjal .............................................................................................................. 42 Joardar ............................................................................................................... 42 Billal .................................................................................................................. 43 Chapra Household Survey ..................................................................................... 45 Secondary Data Collection ............................................................................................. 46 Ethical Issues and Limitations of My Dataset ................................................................ 48 v CHAPTER Three: The Ganges Dependent Area in Bangladesh .......................................... 53 The Dependency of the Gorai Bank Communities on Ganges Hydro-ecology ................................................................................................................ 54 The Farakka Barrage ....................................................................................................... 64 Political Culture .............................................................................................................. 72 Water Policies in the GDA ............................................................................................. 76 CHAPTER Four: The Gorai River Restoration and the Ganges-Kobodak Projects...................................................................................................... 80 The Gorai River Restoration Project .............................................................................. 81 Elite Domination at Chapra ................................................................................... 83 Sedimentation and Charland Domination ............................................................. 88 River Bank Erosion and Embankment Failures .................................................... 89 Flood Vulnerabilities ............................................................................................. 94 Drought Vulnerabilities ......................................................................................... 96 The Ganges-Kobodak Project ......................................................................................... 98 Outcomes of the GK Project ............................................................................... 103 Construction