Rahul Gandhi calls Great Nicobar project the biggest scam

Senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday alleged that the Great Nicobar project at Campbell Bay in Andaman and Nicobar Islands was “one of the biggest scams and gravest crimes against the natural and tribal heritage of the country”.

Stating that the project would entail the axing of millions of trees on 160 sq km of rainforest, and calling it a “destruction dressed in development’s language”, the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha said he would raise the issue in Parliament.

In a social media post, Gandhi said, “I travelled throughout Great Nicobar today. These are the most extraordinary forests I have ever seen in my life. Trees older than memory. Forests that took generations to grow. The people on this island are equally beautiful - both the Adivasi communities and the settlers — but they are being robbed of what is rightfully theirs.”

“The Government calls what it is doing here a ‘project’. What I have seen is not a project. It is millions of trees marked for the axe. It is 160 sq km of rainforest condemned to die. It is communities that have been ignored while their homes have been snatched away. This is not development. This is destruction dressed in development’s language,” he said.

“So, I will say it plainly, and I will keep saying it: what is being done in Great Nicobar is one of the biggest scams and gravest crimes against this country’s natural and tribal heritage in our lifetime. It must be stopped. And it can be stopped — if Indians choose to see what I have seen,” Gandhi added.