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Supreme Court refuses to stay High Court case on Great Nicobar project

By CAShorts DeskPublished Updated Source: The Hindu

Supreme Court refuses to stay High Court case on Great Nicobar project
Illustration (AI-generated)

The Supreme Court on October 5 refused the Centre's plea to stay Calcutta High Court proceedings on a challenge to the over ₹72,000-crore Great Nicobar Island Project. A bench led by Chief Justice Surya Kant asked the High Court to decide quickly, observing that preservation of culture is a constitutionally protected fundamental right.

Syllabus: Prelims · Environment & Ecology; GS2 · Welfare of Vulnerable Sections; GS3 · Environment & Conservation

Why it matters

The order keeps alive a court challenge to a project worth over ₹72,000 crore that the Centre describes as of immense national and strategic importance. The Calcutta High Court, asked to decide without delay, can now go ahead with claims that the project's forest diversion harms a fragile island ecosystem and the Shompen and Nicobarese. Justice Bagchi's oral remark that preserving culture is a constitutionally protected fundamental right suggests that courts may give tribal ways of life serious weight when big projects are approved. The case belongs to a wider debate on balancing security and development with ecology and the rights of forest dwellers.

Prelims pointers

  • The Shompen of Great Nicobar are classified as a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group; the Nicobarese are also reported to be affected by the project.
  • PVTGs are identified by a pre-agricultural level of technology, low literacy, economic backwardness and a stagnant or declining population.
  • The Forest Rights Act, 2006 recognises and vests forest rights in forest-dwelling Scheduled Tribes and other traditional forest dwellers.
  • The National Green Tribunal was set up under the National Green Tribunal Act, 2010 to hear cases on environmental protection and forest conservation.
  • Article 29(1) gives any section of citizens having a distinct language, script or culture of its own the right to conserve it.
  • Great Nicobar is the southernmost island of the Andaman and Nicobar group; Indira Point, India's southernmost point, lies at its southern tip.
  • The Andaman and Nicobar Islands come under the jurisdiction of the Calcutta High Court.
  • In May, the Calcutta High Court rejected the Centre's locus standi objection, which rested on the petitioner not being a local.

Practise a UPSC-style question

With reference to Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs), consider the following statements:

1. The Nicobarese of Great Nicobar, like the Shompen, are classified as a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group.

2. A pre-agricultural level of technology is one of the criteria used to identify a PVTG.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?

  1. (a) 1 only
  2. (b) 2 only
  3. (c) Both 1 and 2
  4. (d) Neither 1 nor 2
Show the answer

Answer: (b) 2 only

1 is incorrect: the Shompen are a PVTG, but the Nicobarese are not; the PVTGs of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands are the Great Andamanese, Jarawa, Onge, Sentinelese and Shompen. 2 is correct: PVTGs are identified by a pre-agricultural level of technology, low literacy, economic backwardness and a stagnant or declining population.

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