The Hindu : National : Andamanese tribal royals long for home

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Jan 13, 2005

National

National

Andamanese tribal royals long for home

PORT BLAIR, JAN. 12. The `royal' couple heading the world's last surviving aboriginal tribe feels uncomfortable in modern clothing at a hospital here and is yearning to go back to rebuild its kingdom. King Jirake and Queen Surmai, who rule over 47-odd Great Andamanese surviving on the earth, are sure they can strike back at the devastation caused by the worst sea fury that they have seen.

In an interview near the hospital where he is being treated for post-tsunami trauma, the king said he wanted to go back to the forests from the urban confines.

Access to the tribal ruler is controlled by the local administration and photography is prohibited: the Andaman and Nicobar administration feels that it would amount to commodification of the innocent tribals.

``We want to get back into our leaves... This is not very comfortable,'' the 62-year-old king said, pointing to his striped shirt and trousers. Queen Surmai, who has been attending on him along with princess Tango, agreed. ``We are the people of the forests. We used to roam around,'' Surmai said in Hindi, which their ancestors learned during the British era.

Nestled in the forests of Strait Island, 250 km off Port Blair, the tribal village was inundated but the members of the hunter-gatherer tribe ran up the nearest hillock and saved themselves.

The tribe is considered by some scholars to be the first tribe on earth, its origins dating back 60,000 years, and the safety of the tribespeople was a matter of concern for the local administration as well as anthropologists across the world after the tsunami.

Princess Tango has another reason to long for her forest home. ``Though all eight of our tribal houses were broken by the tsunami, the television is intact. I have not seen movies for a long time. And so I want to go back fast,'' the 25-year old, mother of three, said. She adores films and loves Bollywood actors. Shahrukh Khan is her favourite.

The princess says that the tribal people, who live on tortoise meat and fish, which they learn to hunt with both arrows and spears by the time they are in their early teens, are fiercely protective about their habitat.

Tango, who studied up to Class XI in a local school, clarifies that the Negrito tribe members are very docile. Her children — Belei, Chomou, Dinu — eating gruel out of small stainless steel bowls, grin. ``They all want to get back home.''

According to official records, maintained by the Adibasi Adim Janajyti Bikash Samiti, the population of the Great Andamanese is now 49, as against 47 as recorded in the 2001 Census. Their number dwindled sharply from the earliest record of 10,000 in 1789 to 625 in 1901, 19 in 1969. It, however, rose to 24 in 1971 and 41 in 1991.

Anthropological experts say that the tribe is highly vulnerable to communicable diseases and that they have unhealthy drinking habits, which they acquired from the outside world and its civilisation.

— PTI

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