Congress leader Jairam Ramesh on Sunday wrote to Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav, urging the Centre to pause and revisit the Great Nicobar Island development project, alleging that it poses a serious threat to the island’s fragile ecosystem and is backed by “grossly inadequate” environmental assessments.
In his letter, Ramesh said the project, in its present form and design, would “destroy” the globally unique biodiversity of Great Nicobar Island and criticised the environmental clearance process, calling it a “mockery of the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) system”.
“I wish to reiterate that the Great Nicobar Island’s biodiversity is globally unique, and new discoveries are being made from time to time. It is this unique ecosystem that will be destroyed by the Great Nicobar Island development project,” Ramesh wrote.
He also questioned the validity of the studies on which environmental clearance was granted, arguing that they do not meet the standards of a proper EIA. According to him, the assessments were based on limited baseline data collected over a few days or weeks, rather than over multiple seasons as required under environmental norms.
“These reports are an insult to science and make a mockery of the EIA process,” he said, adding that his attempts to locate the “comprehensive studies” referred to in official documents had failed.
Ramesh further said that compensatory afforestation arguments cited by the government were “completely bogus”, and claimed that security experts had themselves noted that India’s strategic requirements could be met without causing large-scale ecological damage in the region.
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He also referred to provisions under the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) Notification, 2019, and Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change guidelines, which mandate detailed multi-season baseline studies for port and coastal projects, particularly in ecologically sensitive regions such as the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
Ramesh pointed out that the National Green Tribunal (NGT) had earlier flagged “unanswered deficiencies” in the project’s clearance and directed the formation of a High-Powered Committee to re-examine the approval. He also questioned the government’s stand that the committee’s report was confidential, calling it contrary to transparency and accountability principles.
“I am at a complete loss to understand the logic and legality behind the claim that the HPC’s report is confidential,” he said.
The Congress leader said he was prepared to share extracts from official documents cited by the ministry, asserting that they contradict the government’s public FAQ on the project released earlier this month.
The government has maintained that the Great Nicobar project is a strategic initiative aimed at strengthening India’s presence in the Indian Ocean region, while ensuring a balance between development, environmental safeguards and the protection of indigenous communities.
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