Dear reader,

As a journalist covering land and climate for Scroll, I have been closely following the Modi government's plans to establish an "alternative Hong Kong" on Great Nicobar Island.

Last year, I reported on a startling aspect of this project: to compensate for the loss of nearly a million rainforest trees with the “world's largest curated animal safari park", proposed to be established more than 3,000 km away in Haryana through compensatory afforestation.

I pieced together the stories from my desk in Delhi, using information shared by the Haryana government, interviews with experts and letters written by the leaders of the island's Shompens and Nicobarese tribes. These communities weren't consulted about the project and now face unprecedented displacement, social upheaval and environmental degradation.

Despite this, the crucial voices of its Adivasi groups have travelled to the mainland only sparingly. You can help us fix this.

Please click below to contribute to our special reporting project today.

Pay for The Great Nicobar Project by Scroll.in

Special project: Help us report from the ground on the Great Nicobar Project . . Nearly a million rainforest trees. A tribe with just 400 members. A nesting site of the endangered giant leatherback turtles. All this and more is threatened by the Modi government’s plan to build an alternative “Hong Kong” on the Great Nicobar Island. . . Much has been written about the government’s Rs 72,000-crore proposal to construct an international airport, a transshipment terminal, a power plant and a township on the pristine island, 1,300 km from the mainland. But there has been no ground reporting from the island.. . How will the project impact the island’s indigenous communities, the Shompens and the Nicobarese? Have they even been consulted? What will be the ecological impact of the project, which will cover nearly one-fifth of the island?. . Help Scroll’s climate and land reporter Vaishnavi Rathore get to the Great Nicobar Island to report these stories..

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Your generosity will help me travel to Great Nicobar, interview residents and officials and capture rare visuals of its threatened ecology.

Sincerely,

Vaishnavi Rathore

Can a safari park outside Delhi make up for a lost Nicobar forest?

The Aravalli Safari Park will take over locals’ land, and bring numerous new animal species to the region. Experts deride the plan as misguided.

scroll.in

How the loss of a tropical forest in Nicobar could end up funding a jungle safari in Haryana

Both the legality and the ecological impact of the move are being questioned by environmentalists

scroll.in