SURVIVAL
Tourist films Jarawa on the Andaman Trunk Road PHOTO/© Survival
British newspaper The Observer has revealed evidence of police involvement in ‘human safaris’ in India’s Andaman Islands.
The scandal, first exposed by Survival in 2010, involves tourists using an illegal road to enter the reserve of the Jarawa tribe. Tour companies and cab drivers ‘attract’ the Jarawa with biscuits and sweets.
The Observer has obtained a video showing a group of Jarawa women being ordered to dance for tourists by a policeman, who had reportedly accepted a £200 bribe to take them into the reserve.
One tourist has previously described a similar trip: ‘The journey through tribal reserve was like a safari ride as we were going amidst dense tropical rainforest and looking for wild animals, Jarawa tribals to be specific’.
In recent weeks the Islands’ administration has again ruled out closing the road, known as the Andaman Trunk Road revealed for the first time that it plans to open an alternative route by sea to bypass most of the Jarawa reserve.
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