Where are the Mahananda river's rights?

Once alive with human activity and brimming with fish, the Mahananda river born of Nepal's Himalayas and traversing India's Malda district to reach Bangladesh at Bholahat upazila of Chapainawabganj now runs dry in places. Where cargo boats and passenger launches used to plough river currents, farmers now plough crops. The 95 kilometre waterway through Bangladeshi territory that empties into the Padma river in Rajshahi's Godagari upazila is often reduced to a trickle, if it flows at all.

“There used to be fish aplenty in the Mahananda,” says fisher Hara Haldar from Gohalbari village in Chapainawabganj Sadar upazila. “Now the river is almost dead. It's difficult to earn a living from fishing but I have no alternative.”

“We hardly find any fish due to the drastic fall in water levels,” says another fisher, Premadon Haldar from Prantik Para in Chapainawabganj town. Many fishers have already quit their ancestral profession.

According to Water Development Board officials, India has constructed several dams along the important trans-border watercourse. The restricted flow causes ecological damage and hardship for people downstream.

“We used to reach different parts of the district by launch or steamer, plying the river,” recalls senior citizen Shahfiqul Alam from Hujrapur in the town. “People used to transport agricultural products and various goods by river. Now we can hardly imagine such activity.”

A good number of markets were established along the riverbank to take advantage of river transport links. In bygone days these markets bustled; now they are silent. Several canals that once connected the river to areas further afield are no more. The potential for on-water transport even in small boats is all but lost. With their natural life cycle disrupted, freshwater fish species are gone.

The Indian dams have left little of the river but sand, and there, on the riverbed, farmers grow paddy.

Some find advantage in the predicament. Local influential people are dumping garbage along the riverbank as a prelude to land grabbing, especially in the Khal Ghat and Puraton Bazar areas of Chapainawabganj town.

“The river's situation is alarming,” says the Chapainawabganj coordinator of environmental organisation Save the Nature M.A. Mahbub. “If steps are not taken immediately the river will dry up completely. Protecting the river from encroachment and pollution is a must to secure biodiversity and people's livelihoods.”

But with municipal sewage yet discharged into the river, though there is barely a river to be found, to address even pollution is no easy task.

“On 5 February 2017 we sent a Tk 187 crore proposal to the Planning Commission to dredge the Mohananda and construct a rubber dam in Sadar upazila,” says the Water Development Board's executive engineer in the district, Syed Shahidul Alam. “Siltation has caused an alarming decline in navigability. Underground water levels have also fallen due to siltation.” Whether such measures will be sufficient to revive a once-vibrant river is unclear.