March 12, 2025
Rajya Sabha MP Saket Gokhale’s supplementaries, to his starred question, on the denotification of five villages by the government for the Great Nicobar Island Development Project and its response to the Great Nicobar tribal council’s letter withdrawing NOC for the project, and a request to the government to table the submissions, including the objections, to the empowered committee for the project
Sir, it is unfortunate that in response to the question laid on the Table, the Ministry has declined to answer saying that this matter is sub judice. So, what I am going to do is, I am going to try and make it easier for the Ministry to answer this question, remove anything that might be sub judice even potentially. Sir, this issue pertains to the Shompen and Nicobarese Tribes who are affected by the Great Nicobar Project. We are talking here about a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group which does not have any representation in this House and, therefore, they have led isolated life throughout. They don’t have contact with outside world. So, I just request 30 seconds of your time to introduce my question and then I will ask my supplementary in one line. Sir, the Shompen and Nicobarese Tribes are traditional native to the Great Nicobar Islands and they were displaced during the 2004 Tsunami when it hit their island. After that, they were temporarily resettled and then they requested that they be taken back to their native lands. That has been a long pending demand of these tribes. Even today, the Shompen and Nicobarese Tribes depend on the native island for plantation, for foraging and the land is also very sacred to them. Sir, my specific question is this. Can the Ministry confirm — this is not sub judice — that the Tribal Council of Great Nicobar has constantly opposed the de-notification of the villages of Chingenh, Kokeon, Pulo Pucca, Pulo Baha and In-haeng-loi for the Great Nicobar Project? And, what has been the action taken by the Ministry on the letter of the Tribal Council of Great Nicobar dated 22nd November, 2022, withdrawing the NoC given to the Great Nicobar Project, because they claim that the NoC was obtained after giving them false information? Sir, there is a bit of contradiction here because I asked in my question, ‘the Tribal Council has revoked the NOC.’ It doesn’t matter based on what the hon. Minister said. He said, ‘an Empowered Committee was appointed to examine this issue.’ I have a question. He said that this Committee has included representatives of his Ministry as well. Sir, as a part of this Committee’s proceedings, a vide report documenting the opposition and objection by the tribal communities to the Great Nicobar Project was submitted by very famous anthropologist called Dr. Vishvajit Pandya to the Committee. My question is in two parts. Part one is: Will the hon. Minister please state whether Dr. Pandya’s video report documenting the opposition of local tribes to the Great Nicobar Project was taken on record by the Empowered Committee? If yes, and I am going to request this: Will the hon. Minister kindly provide Government’s assurance that the submissions received by the Empowered Committee, the detailed minutes of the Committee meetings and Dr. Pandya’s video report will be tabled on the floor of the House? That is my first part. My second part, is this. The House must know that there are only 229 members of the Shompen Tribe exist in this world. That is how vulnerable they are. In the recent Lok Sabha election, it happened that only 7 members of the Tribe cast their vote. My question and humble request is that if you want to protect the right of the Shompen Tribals to vote and also for the rest of the Indians, I believe, this House should have a discussion on the duplicate voter ID issue at the earliest. In the next election, along with all other Indians, an urgent discussion should be allowed in the House on the issue of duplicate EPIC.
