Rahul Gandhi calls Great Nicobar Project a crime against nature, tribes

Rahul Gandhi slammed the Centre's mega project in Great Nicobar Island, calling it a direct assault on fragile ecosystems and indigenous communities. He argued that the scale of environmental damage and displacement risks far outweighs any projected strategic or economic gains.

In Short

• Rahul Gandhi sharply criticised the Great Nicobar Project in a public intervention
• He called the project a crime against nature and tribal communities
• His remarks foregrounded environmental damage as a central concern around development

Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, on Wednesday targeted New Delhi’s most ambitious Rs 81,000 crore strategic infrastructure project in Great Nicobar, calling it “one of the biggest scams and gravest crimes against this country’s natural and tribal heritage in our lifetime.”

The Congress leader, currently visiting the island, said the Centre’s ambitious project there is nothing more than “destruction dressed in development’s language.”

Rahul took to X and said, “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 square kilometres of rainforest condemned to die. It is communities that have been ignored while their homes have been snatched away.”

During a visit to the forests of Great Nicobar Island, Rahul Gandhi said the trees there are “older than memory.”

He added that forests nurtured over generations and the “beautiful” people living on the island “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 square kilometres of rainforest condemned to die. It is communities that have been ignored while their homes have been snatched away,” he added.

At the heart of the controversy is the clearance granted by the National Green Tribunal to the mega infrastructure project, which the Congress had earlier described as “half-baked” and “ill-conceived.”

The plan to build a transshipment and logistics hub at the southernmost tip of the Andaman and Nicobar archipelago has previously drawn criticism from Sonia Gandhi, who urged the Centre to reconsider, citing the region’s rich biodiversity and indigenous communities.

The island, which stares at the strategically crucial Strait of Malacca across a 900-kilometre stretch of sea, is also considered geopolitically significant, with both India and China viewing it through a strategic lens amid efforts to counter Beijing’s String of Pearls strategy in the Indian Ocean.

Experts, however, have pointed out that the project could bring in capital, boost trade, and strengthen maritime power -- much like Hong Kong did for China.

In an op-ed last year, Sonia Gandhi described the project as a “series of planned misadventures” that could ultimately uproot the indigenous tribal population there

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