Ignited Mind on Wings of Desire
President APJ Abdul Kalam's four-point mission for the development of
islands might spell doom for Andaman & Nicobar, writes Pankaj
Sekhsaria
India's First Citizen APJ Abdul Kalam's penchant for announcing
grandiose plans as grandiose solutions to problems continue unabated.
While the best-known one is his continued advocacy for the monstrous
interlinking of India's rivers, the latest victim of his visions
could well be the fragile islands of Andaman & Nicobar. The president
visited the islands in May, a significant visit in the light of the
devastating tsunami of December 26, 2004.
He did the normal rounds of places around the islands, particularly
in the Nicobar group that has been the worst hit. He visited Car
Nicobar, Campbel Bay in Great Nicobar and Teressa in the Central
Nicobars, besides meeting representatives of the Nicobari and Shompen
tribal communities.
It was on May 6, 2005, at Car Nicobar, while interacting with
members of the Tribal Council and children, that the president laid
out his four-point mission for the development of the islands - deep
sea fishing, exploitation of bamboo, value added coconut products and
tourism. The Daily Telegrams, the administration's newspaper
published from Port Blair, reported the president as saying, "It (the
islands) will be an abode having all the infrastructure to receive
and service at least 1 million tourists every year." He was further
reported as saying that Andaman & Nicobar had great potential to be
developed on the model of Maldives, where the government leases out
entire islands that are then developed by private enterprises as
self-contained resorts where the government needs to make
no investment.
The proposal has made environmentalists and those working for the
rights of the indigenous peoples extremely worried. "The basis of
this projection is not clear," says Samir Acharya of the Port
Blair-based Society for Andaman and Nicobar Ecology. "It is dangerous
that the president should suggest something on these lines when it
has been proven time and again that the islands do not have the
carrying capacity to support more human activity."
The total official pre-tsunami population of the islands was a little
less than 4,00,000. Even in that situation there was a serious
infrastructure problem that the people of the islands were facing,
including serious water shortages. For many summers now, citizens in
large parts of Port Blair have been receiving piped water only once
in three days and that too for only an hour or so. The problem became
so severe that on occasions water had to be shipped to Port Blair
from other islands.
Significantly, the main tourism season here lasts for only about six
months, from October to March. The water problem becomes
progressively worse as the tourist season progresses and improves
only with the setting in of monsoons in mid May. If this is the
situation in Port Blair that has a population of little over a lakh,
one can only imagine what will happen when a million people will
descend here. What's even more worrying is that in many areas,
particularly in the Nicobars, fresh water sources were among the
worst hit by the tsunami. While the local community is just about
managing to meet its own meagre demands, it is not clear how a
million people will be catered for.
There is a crisis here. The islands are presently dealing with basic
issues like water, food, infrastructure and housing. Would it not be
better (and more ethical) to ensure that first rehabilitation and
reconstruction is done in the best and fastest manner possible? Would
it not be more sensible, for instance, that one gets a sense of the
bamboo resources of the islands or the coconut plantations. Where are
the studies that suggest that these could become the mainstay of the
economy?
Very significantly, this island chain is a fragile biodiversity
hotspot that is home to a number of extremely vulnerable and
threatened indigenous communities like the Jarawa and Onge (in the
Andamans) and the Shompen (in the Nicobars). The entire Nicobar group
of islands and nearly 20 percent of the Andamans has been declared a
tribal reserve to protect these indigenous people. Already, these
communities are significantly outnumbered and marginalised.
Suggesting that one million people should be allowed here is an open
invitation for disaster.
"This vision demands a concerted response," says Dr Madhusree
Mukerjee, author of The Land of Naked People, a hard-hitting
historical account of the indigenous people. "How can someone so
educated be so uninformed?" she asks. "Obviously, the people who
matter are not hearing, or not listening to concerns about carrying
capacity, water, coral destruction and other matters that make such a
grandiose tourism plan ridiculous in practice."
Can someone please tell this to the president?
June 25 , 2005
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