The Great Nicobar Project: Growth, Consent and the Cost of Change

In January 1966, India was staring into an abyss. Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri had just died unexpectedly. Two wars with China and Pakistan in the ’60s hurt the economy. Successive droughts had battered agricultural output. Food stocks were shrinking. It was in this atmosphere of anxiety that Indira Gandhi assumed office. Of course, she was compelled to make tough choices.

At the time, there was a fear that India could become the textbook example of a Malthusian crisis—a nation whose population would outstrip its ability to feed itself. While the United States sent grains as aid, it sought to keep us on a tight leash. Shipments came in monthly tranches. India was expected to show good behaviour by devaluing its currency and making amends with Pakistan on the Kashmir issue.

Then the Green Revolution came as a boon. It introduced new seeds, irrigation systems, fertilisers and farming techniques that rapidly increased agricultural productivity and ensured that India never again had to go around with a begging bowl for food. But there were costs as well.

As early as in 1968, M.S. Swaminathan—popularly known as the Father of the Green Revolution—made an ominous speech in Varanasi. He warned that exploitative, high-yield agriculture could deplete groundwater, poison the soil and cause widespread cancer. In the decades since, each of his prophecies has unfortunately come true. While the Green Revolution fed a billion people, it has also destroyed Punjab’s ecology and health in all the ways Swaminathan feared.

It is important to remember that India’s leaders didn’t have many good options at the time. They knew the trade-offs and made a conscious decision to bolster agriculture nevertheless. A similar tension between immediate necessity and future consequence lies at the heart of one of the most important debates unfolding in India today: the future of Great Nicobar island. In our cover story (see page 14), we have examined this issue deeply. Our endeavour was to create a non-partisan space where both sides of the debate argue their perspectives with nuance—something that our peers in social media or television are constrained to offer.

On the one hand are those who see Great Nicobar as one of the last great ecological frontiers of the Indian subcontinent: a place of ancient rainforests, coral reefs, Leatherback Turtle nesting grounds and indigenous communities whose presence predates the modern Indian state. On the other are those who view the island through the lens of geoeconomics and national security. The fact that Nicobar sits close to a shipping lane through which 30 per cent of global trade passes cannot be overlooked, especially at a time when the Iran-US war in the Strait of Hormuz has wreaked havoc on India’s economy.

For centuries, outside powers have recognised the strategic importance of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The Danes established settlements in the Nicobars in the 18th century. The British followed. The Japanese occupied the islands during the Second World War. In December 1943, Subhas Chandra Bose visited Port Blair as the islands were ceremonially transferred to the provisional government of Azad Hind, even though real control remained with Japan. Geography has repeatedly drawn states and empires to these shores.

Independent India has wrestled with the dilemma of building economic strength versus the costs of development since its birth. Jawaharlal Nehru famously described dams as the “temples of modern India”. Those projects powered cities, irrigated farms and accelerated industrialisation. They also displaced communities and hurt natural landscapes.

There’s a counterexample as well. For decades after Independence, India hesitated to build roads and logistics networks in sensitive frontier regions. Strategic thinking at the time often favoured underdevelopment over accessibility. Meanwhile China spent decades building roads, railways and military infrastructure across Tibet and the Himalayan frontier. Eventually, India was compelled to reverse course.

Every generation of Indian leadership has been asked to make a choice that history will judge harshly either way. But that doesn’t mean that the government’s might should be accepted as always right. Debate and dissent are crucial to the democratic process. India’s democratic history is filled with examples where protest movements exposed genuine failures of the state. The Bhopal gas tragedy forced a national reckoning with industrial safety. The fight over Niyamgiri’s mines demonstrated the importance of local consent. The Kudankulam nuclear plant raised difficult questions about risk, livelihood and public trust. Dissent is not an obstacle to democracy. Public scrutiny improves decisions and sometimes forces the reversal of bad choices.

Yet, the truth and tragedy of governance are that difficult choices must still be made. The democratic process can seek consultation. It can pursue rehabilitation. Minimise damage. It can listen to the last person standing, as Gandhi urged. What it cannot do is eliminate trade-offs altogether. Somebody almost always ends up dissatisfied with a collective decision. That is not merely a flaw of democracy. It is one of the burdens of nationhood.

Neeraj Thakur is editor, Outlook