2 months ago
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On January 18 this twelvemonth a Great Nicobar Island based online quality portal, www.nicobartimes.com, published an important quality point related to the mega-infrastructure task connected the land that has been header quality crossed the state for galore months now. This peculiar contented has, however, hardly been noticed, permission unsocial creating thing adjacent to adjacent a ripple.
The report, “DEF-GNI Objects to Low Minimum Circle Rates Fixed for Villages of Campbell Bay Tehsil, Seeks Revision Ahead of Airport Land Acquisition”, highlighted the grievances of the Great Nicobar’s settler (non-tribal) assemblage successful the substance of the compensation being awarded for their onshore that is being acquired for the mega-project nether the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency successful Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (RFCTLARR) Act, 2013. About 300 families of ex-servicemen were settled successful Great Nicobar betwixt 1969 and 1975 for which astir 40 quadrate kilometres were de-notified from the Tribal Reserve. The descendants of these settlers present signifier the bulk of the colonisation here. “The Dependents and Ex-Servicemen Forum for Equitable Negotiation, Compensation & Entitlements – Great Nicobar Island (DEF-GNI)”, the study noted, “has raised beardown objections to the minimum ellipse rates fixed for villages nether Campbell Bay Tehsil, terming them unreasonably debased and unjust.”
Inadequate compensation
At the bosom of the substance is the debased rates of compensation, ranging from ₹113 to ₹180 per quadrate metre, they are being offered arsenic against the ₹11,370 - ₹20,500 per quadrate metre offered successful the Andaman islands erstwhile onshore is acquired for tourism projects. The forum requested that the rates beryllium fixed successful a mode that ensures a minimum compensation of not little than ₹1 crore per acre of cultivation onshore to affected landowners.
The substance has besides been raised regularly by the lone Member of Parliament (MP) from the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Bishnu Pada Ray of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). In December, helium had written to the Prime Minister and the Home Minister making a fig of related points: that the onshore was being acquired from ex-servicemen settler families who were primitively brought present by the authorities to service strategical and nationalist information purposes; these families had already faced 2 large displacements, 1 during the archetypal colony and past again aft the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami; determination were large procedural violations successful the onshore acquisition process; determination were superior deficiencies successful the societal interaction appraisal carried retired for this land, and that compensation being offered should beryllium ₹32 lakh per hectare arsenic against ₹9 lakh being offered currently.
There are 2 things that basal out: archetypal the assertion makers — the MP included — are explicit that they, the settler families, are not opposing the project. Their lone petition is adherence to owed process and ensuring that nary household is near without onshore oregon livelihood.
The 2nd is the heavy contradiction astatine the bosom of (un)democratic practice and authorities here: the settler assemblage and their representatives, portion seen seeking fairness and justness implicit their ain land, are besides collaborating with the aforesaid authorities successful alienating land, livelihood and the resources of Great Nicobar’s tribal communities (the Shompen and the Great Nicobarese) to marque it disposable for the aforesaid project.
Alienating tribal lands
In a process marked by superior substantive and procedural impropriety, astir 84 sq.km of legally notified tribal reserve is sought to beryllium denotified and handed implicit to task authorities. Everyone from section agencies specified arsenic the Andaman and Nicobar Tribal Welfare Department, to the section settler communities, to nationalist level bodies specified arsenic the Union Ministries of Environment and of Tribal Affairs person been complicit.
Evidence of this tin beryllium seen successful the near-complete lack of the Shompen successful discussions, the unit being exerted connected the Nicobarese to ‘voluntarily’ surrender their lands for the project, the nationalist and vociferous enactment expressed by settlers and authorities, and the explicit usurpation of provisions of the Forest Rights Act, successful which representatives of the settler assemblage person signed documents freeing up tribal reserve onshore for the project.
Pertinent issues being ignored
No 1 tin contradict the close of the settlers to capable compensation. But what astir the archetypal islanders specified arsenic the nomadic huntsman gatherer Shompen that is notified arsenic a peculiarly susceptible tribal group, a PVTG? They whitethorn not privation compensation due to the fact that they person nary usage for the wealth we offer. What astir the Nicobarese who privation to instrumentality to their accepted pre-tsunami lands and settlements but are not being provided the means to bash so? And what of the interaction connected lives, livelihoods and cultures of these communities that are wholly babelike connected the oversea and the forests? What besides of the pristine forests and unsocial biodiversity that volition beryllium mislaid forever?
This concern underlines aggregate things astatine the aforesaid time. On the crushed it highlights the stark quality of (un)democratic section authorities arsenic adjacent communities are forced into contention and struggle implicit onshore and resources. At the macro level, it highlights however section communities and rights to resources are lone insignificant pawns successful the larger geo-political and improvement agendas of the state, of its larger governmental economy, and so the rhetoric of nationalist sovereignty and strategical autonomy.
The contradictions mightiness not beryllium disposable to the section settler communities oregon possibly they bash not person the bureau oregon the choice. The aforesaid surely cannot beryllium said for the state, the federation and for nine astatine large. There is overmuch for america to deliberation astir and ponder over.
Pankaj Sekhsaria is the author/editor of 7 books connected the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, the latest being ‘The Great Nicobar Betrayal’ (Frontline Magazine, 2024) and ‘Island connected Edge – The Great Nicobar Crisis’ (2025). The views expressed are personal
