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Great Nicobar tribals allege administration asking them to ‘surrender’ ancestral lands
Members of the Great Nicobar Tribal Council on Thursday alleged that in a January 7 meeting with the district administration, they were asked to sign “surrender certificates” as a way to hand over their ancestral lands to the government.
In a virtual press conference on Thursday, the tribal chiefs alleged that the administration made the demand to develop the Great Nicobar Project, which includes construction of a new township, a power plant, a greenfield international airport and a transshipment port.
The project is expected to use 166 sq km of the island, which also includes around 27 coastal villages that the Nicobarese tribal communities had lived in for generations and depended on for livelihoods.
“We are against this,” a council member, who did not want to be identified, said about the certificates. “This would mean that we have given the land directly in the administration's hands forever. It is important for our children's future security.”
The tribal chiefs said that the administration made the request to them verbally during the meeting held in Great Nicobar's Campbell Bay village. Officials from the district commissioner's office and the Andaman Adim Janjati Vikas Samiti were present in the meeting.
The Samiti is an autonomous body that works for the welfare and protection of vulnerable tribal groups.
The tribal members did not sign the certificate, saying that they needed time to deliberate on the matter.
Nicobar's assistant commissioner declined to comment stating that he was not authorised to speak on the matter. Scroll also reached out to Andaman and Nicobar's chief secretary's office. This report will be updated if they respond.
The Nicobarese have been demanding that the administration let them return to their ancestral villages.
After the tsunami in 2004, the district administration had relocated the survivors in two settlements in Campbell Bay – New Chingenh and Rajiv Nagar – where they were provided wooden houses on stilts with tin roofs and plywood flooring.
“Before settling us, they told us that this is a temporary measure,” said another member. “Our population is slowly increasing, and we cannot expand our houses here. There is no space for cultivating anything.”
On their ancestral lands along the western coast of the island, the communities grew and tended coconut plantations, pandanus trees, and depended on the sea for fishing. Several members of the community continue to go to these villages for short periods to tend to their coconut trees.
“It's been 21 years since we were relocated,” said a member. “We have even written letters demanding to return, but we have gotten no response from the administration. We are very uncomfortable here.”
In August, the tribal council had written to the Union tribal affairs minister saying that through a 2022 certificate, the island administration had made an allegedly false representation to the Centre suggesting that all rights under the 2006 Forest Rights Act had been identified and settled before diverting the required forest land for the Great Nicobar Project.
“If the administration is claiming that they have settled these rights under FRA, then what is the need for such surrender certificates?” asked a tribal chief.
“All we are demanding is that if they want to do the project, they should do it on the non-tribal lands,” he added.
Also watch: True Story: How we investigated the disappearing corals of Great Nicobar
Source: Scroll
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