Port Blair: The Andaman and Nicobar
administration today said that it would serve legal notice on
two Delhi-based TV channels telecasting a video footage
showing a group of tribal women being ordered to dance for
tourists by a policeman.
British newspaper, `The Guardian` and `The Observer`, a
weekly, had released video footage of police involvement in
`human safaris` in the Andaman Islands. The videos were
recently aired on the two Delhi-based channels.
The policeman had allegedly taken a bribe of 200 GBP to
take tourists into the protected Jarawa reserve.
While Andaman and Nicobar police remained tight-lipped
about the incident, administration sources said that
legal notice would be served on the two TV Channels regarding
this matter as the footage was one-sided and they had not
taken the version of administration or cross-checked with it.
The sources said the administration was "totally
against Jarawa tourism" but ruled out closure of the Andaman
Trunk (ATR) road ordered by the Supreme Court a decade ago to
protect the Jarawa habitat. The road cuts through South
Andaman where the Jarawa reserve is located, linking Port
Blair with Diglipur in North Andaman.
The official said any decision on closure of the road,
the lifeline of the Middle and North Andamans, would take time
as it was a policy decision but said an alternative route via
sea was being chalked out to bypass the Jarawa reserve.
A Supreme Court ruling in 2002 on the Shekhar Singh
Commission report had ordered closure of the ATR road to
protect the Jarawas.
PTI
