WORLD
Tourists pay for jungle drive which treats primitive tribe like zoo animals
Baku, January 11 (AZERTAC). One of the world`s most primitive tribes is being humiliated on a daily basis - by tourists who pay to go on human safaris and treat them like animals in a zoo. Hundreds of visitors to the remote Andaman Islands, north of the Equator in the Indian Ocean, queue up each day at dawn to drive through a jungle reserve set aside for the Jarawa tribe. They then toss scraps of food to the half-naked natives, who only started making contact with the outside world in the late 1990s, and command them to dance. The 403 tribe members should, in theory, be protected by strict laws on the Indian-run island. Tourists can pay touts £350 to take part in the convoy, with local police taking a £200 cut and turning a blind eye to the exploitation. Visitors are regularly seen throwing bananas and biscuits to tribe`s people waiting at the side of the track. Similar scenes are seen across Britain as people feed animals in a zoo. Photojournalist Gethin Chamberlain joined a tour run by Rajesh Vyas who said the tours were `very popular` with the British. Vyas said: `It will cost 15,000 rupees (£182) to buy off the police and about the same for a car, driver, gifts for the Jarawa, biscuits, snacks. It is guaranteed.`
The Jarawa lived detached from the modern world until 1998, when one of them needed hospital treatment - and told the rest of the tribe about life away from the reserve. They now regularly visit local towns and settlements.
Denis Giles, editor of the campaigning Andaman Chronicle newspaper, said the Jarawa were being `abused`. He said: `They know they need to mix in the outside world but it should not be a culture shock - they should choose the pace at which they do it.
And Ajai Saxena, the government official responsible for the reserve, said: `These tours do not respect the Jarawa.
`We have told the tour operators they must not stop but we cannot control every vehicle.`