Great Nicobar Island, the southernmost tip of the Andaman and Nicobar archipelago, is one of the most pristine and isolated ecosystems on the planet, and the home of the Shompen and the Nicobarese tribes and unique wildlife.

Nicobar Tribal Council says it is being pressured to sign ‘surrender certificate’ for ancestral tribal lands

This tranquillity is poised for a radical transformation. The Indian government has sanctioned a ₹72,000-crore mega-infrastructure initiative called the ‘Holistic Development of Great Nicobar Island’. Spearheaded by the NITI Aayog and implemented by the Andaman and Nicobar Islands Integrated Development Corporation, the project envisions transforming the remote outpost into a major transshipment and defence hub.

What is in Great Nicobar, site of NITI Aayog’s mega project? | Explained

The project covers around 166 sq. km, or nearly 18% of the island’s total land area, and entails an integrated city-state designed to serve both commercial and military purposes. The crown jewel is the international Container Transshipment Terminal in Galathea Bay. The bay’s natural depth is ideal to handle large container ships that currently dock in Colombo, Singapore or Klang. The government has said the terminal will eventually handle 14.2 million TEUs of cargo, capturing a significant slice of the transshipment revenue.

The mirage of port-led development in Great Nicobar

A new greenfield airport serving both civilian and military needs is planned for 24/7 operations, including handling 4,000 passengers per hour at its peak. The government has said this airport will offer a forward base for surveillance and logistics in the Indian Ocean region.

Perhaps the project’s most transformative aspect is the new township. The government has estimated that over the next 30 years, the local population will swell from the current 8,000 to more than 3.5 lakh people. The township will include industrial zones and residential areas and will effectively urbanise a significant chunk of the rainforest. All this infrastructure will be powered by a new 450-MVA gas- and solar-based power plant.

Great Nicobar Island project: map ready for denotification of tribal reserve

India’s push is driven by geopolitics and economics. The island overlooks the western entrance of the Strait of Malacca, a narrow shipping lane through which around 40% of the world’s trade and most of China’s energy imports pass. In the event of a conflict, a robust military presence here would allow India to theoretically monitor or interdict Chinese naval assets entering the Indian Ocean. Second, nearly 75% of India’s transshipment cargo is currently handled by ports outside the country, increasing the logistic costs for Indian trade. A transshipment hub at Great Nicobar could on the other hand allow India to service its own cargo as well as attract international vessels.

Great Nicobar Island Project: over 70 experts, scientists write to Environment Minister on ‘grave’, irreversible’ impact

Source of controversy

The project’s primary source of controversy has been speed, which critics have argued is part of government efforts to sidestep due diligence. In 2021, NITI Aayog engaged AECOM, a global infrastructure firm, to prepare a pre-feasibility report. In March 2022, the terms of reference for the environmental impact assessment (EIA) were finalised. And in November, the Union Environment Ministry granted stage-I forest clearance to divert 130.75 sq. km of forest land. Days later, the final clearance was granted as well.

‘Inaccuracies, procedural violations’ in Great Nicobar draft environment impact assessment report

The rapidity raised eyebrows because the project required denotifying parts of a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve and tribal reserve. Galathea Bay is itself a crucial nesting site for the giant leatherback turtle, ancient mariners that travel thousands of kilometres to nest on these beaches. Building breakwaters and dredging for the port will effectively destroy the beach and permanently drive the turtles away. Conservationists and policymakers have also criticised the EIA for being based on a single season of data rather than the comprehensive multi-season data usually required for projects of this magnitude.

To build the township and airport, an estimated 9.64 lakh trees will be cut, per government figures; independent ecologists fear the number could be higher. These forests are the only home of the Nicobar megapode and the Nicobar tree shrew.

Forest rights of tribal people were not settled for Nicobar project: council

The rules require the state to plant trees elsewhere to ‘compensate’ for the deforestation. Since there is no land left in the archipelago, the government has proposed planting trees in Haryana, thousands of kilometres away — an idea ecologists have scoffed at because planting saplings in a dry, dusty scrubland in North India couldn’t possibly replace the complex ecological functions of a tropical evergreen rainforest in the Bay of Bengal.

The project will also affect more than 20,000 coral colonies. The government has proposed translocating these corals to other sites but that’s a complex process with a notoriously low survival rate worldwide. Overall, critics have said the state’s ideas amount to ticking boxes rather than a genuine conservation strategy.

The Great Nicobar project and a Ministry in knots

The project’s social effects are likely to be equally volatile. The island is home to two distinct indigenous groups, the Nicobarese and the Shompen. The Shompen are a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG) — largely semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers who have lived in the island’s interior for millennia, with limited contact with the outside world.

While the government claims the Shompen settlements won’t be disturbed, anthropologists are clear that an influx of 3 lakh outsiders and construction activity will push them into smaller pockets of land. The Shompen also lack immunity to common diseases. Greater contact with construction workers and tourists thus poses a severe risk of an epidemic that could wipe out the tribe, a fear international scholars have articulated as a risk of “genocide”.

Tragic history

While the Nicobarese are more assimilated, they have a tragic history with the project site. Before the 2004 tsunami, many of its members lived on the west coast; after the tsunami, they were relocated to the east coast with the promise that they could eventually return to their ancestral lands. But by designating the west coast for the project, the government is effectively barring the Nicobarese from ever returning home.

Under the Forest Rights Act 2006, diverting forest land requires the gram sabhas’ consent. Reports, however, indicate that the Tribal Council issued a ‘no objection certificate’ in 2022, only to withdraw it later alleging the Council had been rushed into signing without understanding the implications. The government has proceeded with the project anyway.

In 2023, the National Green Tribunal temporarily stayed the project and constituted a high-powered committee to revisit its clearances. However, the committee submitted its report in a sealed cover and the NGT allowed the project to proceed saying the committee had found the project to be compliant. Critics, including a group of former civil servants, condemned this lack of transparency saying an environmental clearance process for a public project couldn’t be treated as a state secret.

Tribal leaders continue to protest, with captains from Great Nicobar alleging publicly that they were forced by district administrations to sign “surrender certificates” for their land, further fuelling suspicions that the government is bulldozing the project through.