The so-called “mega development project” of Great Nicobar Island is being pushed by the Modi government as a symbol of progress. But from an environmentalist’s standpoint, as from anyone with human rights as an anchor – as our Constitution guarantees, it is something far more troubling. It’s nothing less than a blueprint for a massive ecological erasure in one of the last remaining intact tropical rainforest landscapes in South Asia, and one among several critical remaining ones on Earth. And that erasure will be “forever” in a country’s civilisational time scale.
Great Nicobar is not just any “forest land”, as even many scrublands are defined. It is a living, breathing ecological wonderland of extraordinary richness and rarity. Lying within the Indo-Burma Biodiversity Hotspot, the island contains primary (old-growth) rainforests, meaning ecosystems that have evolved over tens of thousands of years without large-scale human disturbance.
Dense tropical rainforests like these store massive amounts of carbon in both above ground biomass and soil, acting as natural buffers against climate change. Their destruction releases this carbon irreversibly, at least in the centuries-scale measurements. They are also very good
hydrological stabilizers – the rainforest regulates rainfall patterns, groundwater recharge, and prevents soil erosion — especially crucial on an island vulnerable to cyclones and tsunamis.
Scientists have repeatedly emphasized that many species here are still undocumented, even unknown to science. Destroying these pristine forests means wiping out unknown medicinal, ecological, and evolutionary knowledge forever, which might be critically needed for human adaptation in this age of rapid climate collapse.
Among the many species uniquely tied to this ecosystem:
The Nicobar megapode, a ground-dwelling bird that builds remarkable incubation mounds from forest debris, the giant leatherback sea turtle which nests at Galathea Bay — one of the most important nesting sites in the Indian Ocean, endemic reptiles, amphibians, and insects found nowhere else on Earth.
Coral reefs and mangrove systems that form an integrated land-sea ecological continuum: This is not replaceable biodiversity. It is irreplaceable.
The Indian government’s plan to do the replacement plantations in the Haryana Aravallis, smells of absurdity and massive corruption. These are two completely different ecosystems, the Aravalli mountains being a sparse dry forest area, not even comparable to the dense tropical rainforest of Great Nicobar. No comparison of biodiversity, of carbon storage and climate control.
For the Shompen and the Nicobarese, the traditional residents of Great Nicobar, the rainforest is not a “resource” — it is identity, sustenance, culture and history.
Source: Global Research
