​Troubled waters: On the Great Nicobar Project

Proponents of the controversial Great Nicobar Project will be enthused by an order from the Kolkata bench of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) ruling that all environmental safeguards are in place, that the potential impact of this gargantuan project on resident native populations of the region is duly accounted for, and the project’s “strategic utility” is reason enough for the government to not be fully transparent with what it shares in the public domain. But the dominant narrative around the project mirrors the classic development versus environment conflict of a pristine Pandora being ravaged for the greed of far-away mainlanders. The Great Nicobar Island Project (GNIP) envisages a trans-shipment port, an international airport, township development, and a 450 Megavolt-Amperes (MVA) gas and solar-based power plant. In the early 20th century, the British Phosphate Commissioners (a joint venture of the U.K., Australia, and New Zealand) began large-scale phosphate mining for fertilizer on Nauru and Banaba in the Pacific Ocean. By 1945, the island had been so physically devastated by strip mining that it was deemed uninhabitable. The native Banabans were forcibly relocated to Rabi Island in Fiji, over 2,000 kilometres away. Today, Banaba is a desolate landscape of jagged limestone “pinnacles” and the displaced population is fighting for the rehabilitation of its homeland. These serve as historical precedents for why economic logic alone cannot dictate actions in remote territories. Though accorded an environment and preliminary forest clearance by the Union Environment Ministry, concerns about the potential loss of biodiversity, tree-felling, and impact on resident tribes prompted the NGT to order a review of the environmental aspects of the project.

Independent scientists and environmentalist groups have said that the felling of tracts of pristine tropical forest — nearly nine lakh trees across 130 sq.km — for this project would significantly harm the biodiversity of the region and constitute an irreparable loss. This is not counting the disturbance to leatherback turtle nesting grounds and the assault on the corals. There was also the contested matter of whether the community rights of the local Shompen and the Nicobarese tribes were fully settled under the requirements of the Forest Rights Act. Recently, members of the Tribal Council said they were being coerced to sign “surrender certificates” that implied their consent to large parts of their land being diverted for the project. The NGT order essentially rubber-stamps the government’s appraisal process without independently examining the concerns raised. It only imposes faith that the government will be a conscientious executor of the project. Whether the Great Nicobar Project is a ‘net good’ can only be judged by future generations, but the lack of a process that offers a fair appraisal of independent concerns bodes ill for the present.