Killing the Great Nicobar
“To slow a beast, you break its limbs.
To slow a nation, you break its people. You rob them of volition.” I’m quoting
Arundhati Roy’s 1999 essay The Greater Common Good. She was writing about
the disastrous impact of big dams on nations.
Big dams are weapons of mass destruction,
she wrote. They help a government demonstrate its absolute command over
people’s destiny. “You (the Government) make it clear that ultimately it
falls to you to decide who lives, who dies, who prospers, who doesn’t. To
exhibit your capability you show off all that you can do, and how easily you
can do it. How easily you could press a button and annihilate the earth. How
you can start a war or sue for peace. How you can snatch a river away from one
and gift it to another. How you can … fell a forest…. You use caprice to fracture
a people’s faith in ancient things – earth, forest, water, air.”
Roy wrote that years before Donald
Trump started a war for no reason in Iran and Narendra Modi decided to clear
130 sq km of tropical rainforest, mangroves, coral ecosystems, and rare
biodiversity in Great Nicobar.
Modi has been bringing “development”
to India ever since he ascended the throne in Indraprastha. The latest ‘development’
is the mega project in Great Nicobar Island. This island’s pristine natural
wealth, one of India’s last great ecological sanctuaries, will be destroyed
entirely to make way for a seaport, airport, township, and “strategic growth.”
If you’re not wealthy enough to live,
move, and have your being in airconditioned rooms, you must be experiencing the
unbearable heat in the air these days. The summer is yet to come, but we are
already on fire. Gifted by Development.
Do we need more of this Development?
Great
Nicobar is not an empty stretch of land waiting for concrete. It is a living
world. Dense tropical rainforests breathe there with ancient patience. Mangroves
protect fragile coasts. Coral reefs pulse with marine life. Rare creatures move
through its forests and shores, often unnoticed by those who draw lines on maps
sitting in distant airconditioned offices.
To clear vast stretches of forest in
such a place is not merely to remove trees. It is to unravel relationships
built over centuries. Forests are communities. Birds nest in them. Insects
pollinate within them. Soil organisms enrich them. Rain cycles depend on them.
When a rainforest falls, what disappears is not timber alone, but an entire life-sustaining
system of nature.
Great Nicobar is home to endangered
species whose survival already hangs in balance. Leatherback turtles nest
on its beaches. Endemic animals found nowhere else depend on its habitat. Once
their breeding grounds are disturbed, no amount of official compensation can
recreate what is lost. You can plant saplings elsewhere, but you cannot
instantly grow an ancient ecosystem.
Then there is the sea. Coastal
construction, dredging, shipping traffic, and urban expansion threaten marine
ecosystems already stressed by climate change. Coral reefs do not negotiate
with bulldozers. Mangroves cannot be relocated like furniture. When coastlines
are damaged, the sea remembers. That memory will return one day with unbearable
fury.
Great Nicobar lies in a region marked
by seismic vulnerability and the memory of the 2004 tsunami. To build
massive infrastructure in such a landscape demands not only engineering
confidence but ecological humility. Nature has already shown that islands are
not easily conquered.
I’m not an anti-progress Luddite or
reactionary. I acknowledge that nations must plan for trade, security, and
growth. But development that destroys the very foundations of ecological
stability is a contradiction. Progress that leaves behind poisoned waters,
displaced wildlife, and broken habitats is not progress; it is deferred
disaster.
Forests are not obstacles. They are
inheritances that require careful nurturing. Value does not lie only in cargo
capacity and real estate, but also in biodiversity, climate resilience, and
nature’s beauty.
Great Nicobar begs India to decide
what kind of civilisation it wishes to be. One that treats nature as
expendable, or one that understands that the wealth of a nation includes its
forests.
India now stands at a juncture when
it must choose between ‘development’ and wisdom, between spectacle and
stewardship. Some losses arrive with applause and ribbon-cuttings. Only later
do we hear the silence where birds once sang.
x
That's a tragedy. The worst thing to do for climate change is to destroy an ecosystem like that. The international community needs to know about this because it will cause an uproar.
ReplyDeleteI do hope this project doesn't go beyond this stage (planning). There must be an uproar against it. The project is a heinous crime against the planet.
DeleteDown where my son lives. They removed four dam off the Kalmath river. If I remember I will ask him about it.
ReplyDeleteRivers have to be set free sometimes.
DeleteWhat is needed to wipe off the face of the Earth, 130 sq. Kms of Virgin Rain Forest is not Ecological Humility but Upstartish arrogance. I have seen the vast coral leaf looking dead, but coming live, at the touch of the boatman's, stick. I have been to the Andamans. Do you remember your Shillong Friend from the Anthropologie Dept, who had done his Ph. D on the Jarawas of the Andamans. Wars, Dams and ports do the same thing... Destruction
ReplyDeleteWho's that Shillong friend? I cannot recall.
DeleteIs Modi intelligent enough to understand ecology? He doesn't see beyond the tip of his nose.
Indeed, wars, dams, and enormous development projects are all disastrous.
what can we as people do? That should be our question. How can we retrieve the power we have bequeathed to politician?
ReplyDeleteIf ordinary people ask what they can do, the answer is simple: become visible, become informed, and become difficult to ignore. Unfortunately, Indians are still concerned about Rama and Krishna and Sita and Hanuman...
Deletevery true. The garbage on the road, the trees broken down we don't take responsibility for it.
DeleteHari OM
ReplyDeleteProgress that leaves behind poisoned waters, displaced wildlife, and broken habitats is not progress; it is deferred disaster. That is the telling line here. It captures everything explored in the body of your post. Such short-sightedness, such hubris of a government (leader) to make such plans. How has the world landed itself with so many such nincompoops?! YAM xx
People elect nincompoops: that's the sad answer. I've been trying to find half a dozen thinking people in my village for years.
DeletePowerful perspective—but there’s another layer to consider.
ReplyDeleteAs outlined by NITI Aayog, the Great Nicobar project is not just about development, but also national security. Its proximity to the Malacca Strait makes it crucial for monitoring one of the world’s busiest trade routes and balancing the growing presence of China in the Indian Ocean.
Alongside this, the project promises better connectivity, healthcare, jobs, and infrastructure for island communities long cut off from such opportunities.
So the question isn’t simply development versus environment—it’s whether India can safeguard both its ecology and its strategic future with equal wisdom.
I understand your concern as the spouse of a defence personnel. But your view has a lot of questions to worry about, I think.
DeleteFirst off, a nation is not secured by ports and runways. It needs resilient coastlines, healthy forests, freshwater systems, biodiversity, and communities able to survife climate shocks. Destroying natural buffers such as mangroves and forests in a tsunami-prone, seismic island can create new vulnerabilities while trying to solve old ones.
Yes, proximity to the Malacca Strait is geopolitically significant. But significance alone does not prove that a mega-township, extensive forest clearance, and large-scale urbanization are the only or best options. A lighter-footprint strategy—limited naval/logistics facilities, carefully scaled port functions, stronger surveillance systems, and phased development—may meet security needs with less irreversible damage.
Promises of jobs, healthcare, and connectivity sound persuasive. But large projects often benefit outside contractors, transient labor, and mainland investors more than indigenous or small local communities. The key question is: Who decides, who gains, and who bears the cost? If traditional communities lose land, cultural autonomy, or ecological resources, then “development” may be something done to them rather than for them.
Island ecosystems recover slowly and are highly sensitive to disruption. Freshwater is limited. Waste management is harder. Coastal erosion risk is higher. Biodiversity loss can be permanent. What works on the mainland cannot simply be copied onto a remote island rainforest.
Invoking geopolitical rivalry can sometimes silence scrutiny. But wise states do not answer one strategic challenge by creating another. If a project becomes environmentally unstable, socially contested, or financially burdensome, it weakens national capacity rather than strengthening it.
Well written. Development without ecological wisdom is disaster in waiting. Great Nicobar must be protected.
ReplyDeleteUndoubtedly. I hope India will understand this. But our government has already made most of Indians utter fools, I understand.
DeleteRelevant and timely post. I wish Indians were more aware about their ecological heritage and their responsibility to nature and the natural world.
ReplyDelete