‘Fake claims’: Great Nicobar lighthouse project study lists species found in Africa, Amazon

Species primarily found in Africa and the Amazon have been listed in a recent environment impact assessment study claiming that they live on Great Nicobar Island.

The report released in April was prepared by WAPCOS Limited, a Gurgaon-based public sector undertaking as part of a proposal to repair the lighthouse and construct tourist facilities at Indira Point, the southern-most point of the island – and of India.

Tables in the environment impact assessment report list tiger fish (Hydrocynus vittatus), a native of African freshwater rivers, and the flagtail (Semaprochilodus insignis), an Amazonian freshwater fish.

Also listed are sambar (Cervus unicolor) and barking deer (Muntiacus muntjak), two species of mammals found primarily on India’s mainland.

More than 90% of the species listed in the tables in the study have never been reported from Great Nicobar. In many cases the closest sites are thousands of kilometres away.

Ecologists and marine biologists who have spent decades studying Great Nicobar said the report was “shocking” and alleged that it was “completely fabricated”.

The study includes the Eurasian woodcock (Scolopax rusticola), a bird of temperate and subarctic Eurasia that is found in Sri Lanka and along India’s western coast only in the non-breeding season, and the Mayabandar rice frog (Microhyla chakrapanii), which has only ever been reported from the Andaman Islands but not the Nicobar.

At the same time, the report...

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