Jairam Ramesh flags tribal rights violations in Great Nicobar project

Senior Congress leader Jairam Ramesh wrote to Tribal Affairs Minister Jual Oram on Wednesday, flagging “flagrant violation” of the rights of tribal communities in Great Nicobar Island Project and sought remedial action immediately.

In his letter to Oram, the former environment minister termed as “entirely false” the assertion in the Government FAQs issued on May 1 that all statutory procedures and policy safeguards for the protection of tribal communities were duly complied with in the project.

“The Great Nicobar Project: FAQs issued by the Union Government on May 1, 2026, stated that ‘all statutory procedures and policy safeguards for the protection of tribal communities have been duly complied with in the Great Nicobar Island Project. Necessary consultations were undertaken with competent authorities and domain experts, including the Anthropological Survey of India, Ministry of Tribal Affairs, and other stakeholders, in line with the Jarawa Policy, 2004, and Shompen Policy, 2015. This is entirely false,” Ramesh said.

The Ministry of Tribal Affairs, as the nodal agency for implementation of the Forest Rights Act, 2006, must take serious note of the “flagrant violation” of the rights of tribal communities and due processes under that historic law in the case of the Great Nicobar Island Project and take credible remedial action immediately, the Congress leader demanded in his letter.

“The Gram Sabha has to (i) consider any proposal for diversion of forest lands in which tribal communities live; (i) certify that their claims under the FRA, 2006 have been settled; and only thereafter (iii) consent to the diversion of such forest lands, if indeed that is its decision. The Hon’ble Supreme Court in the Niyamgiri judgment of April 18, 2023, held that such consent is mandatory under the FRA, 2006,” he pointed out.

However, for the diversion of more than 13,000 hectares of forest lands for the Great Nicobar project, which includes the traditional, ancestral lands of the Nicobarese and Shompen settlements, the island administration admits to convening gram sabhas of the settler communities in Campbell Bay, Laxmi Nagar and Govind Nagar on August 12, 2022, he said.

The resolutions of these gram sabhas of the settler communities are cited as consent of the gram sabhas under the FRA, 2006, Ramesh noted.

The letter to Oram comes days after Ramesh wrote to Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav, claiming that the Great Nicobar Island development project would “destroy” the unique ecosystem there, and urging him to pause, reflect, and revisit the venture in its present design and detail.

The Centre, on May 1, released a detailed statement with answers to FAQs (frequently asked questions).  “The Great Nicobar Project is a strategic initiative to strengthen India’s presence in the Andaman Sea. It seeks to balance port-led growth with calibrated environmental safeguards. Protection of indigenous communities remains central to its planning,” the Government statement read.