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View all search resultsGreat Nicobar and India’s Southeast Asia push
The Great Nicobar Project, part of India’s Andaman and Nicobar Islands, is a strategic project which aims to strengthen India’s presence in the Andaman Sea and Southeast Asia.
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Precarious arrival: Passengers on a boat on March 30, 2026, get ready to board the MV Kalighat vessel (not in picture) near Teressa in the waters of India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands. (AFP/R. Satish Babu)
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he Great Nicobar Project, part of India’s Andaman and Nicobar Islands, is a strategic project which aims to strengthen India’s presence in the Andaman Sea and Southeast Asia. The project seeks to balance port-led growth with calibrated environmental safeguards and protection of indigenous communities.
By combining strategic, economic and ecological priorities, the project seeks to ensure that development in Great Nicobar is sustainable, inclusive and aligned with national interests. The project’s strategic and economic significance is underscored by the need to position Great Nicobar as a critical node in the Indian Ocean Region.
The project will be yet another initiative to connect India with Indonesia and its maritime neighbors. The project includes International Container Transhipment Terminal (ICTT) with a capacity of 14.2 million twenty-foot equivalent units, Greenfield International Airport (4000 peak hour passengers), and a 450 megavolt-ampere (MVA) gas and solar-based power plant and a new township spanning 16,610 hectares. The development follows a sensitive and holistic approach. It considers the needs of indigenous communities and aims to protect the Great Nicobar’s ecological resources.
India's ports lack deep water berths for large ships. Because of this, cargo is routed through Colombo and Singapore. India loses substantial revenue as a result. Countries like Myanmar, China and Sri Lanka are already building deep water facilities to capture this trade.
In this context, the International Container Transhipment Port (ICTP) at Galathea Bay is being developed as part of the Holistic Development of Great Nicobar Island under the island development program. Along with the proposed airport, township, and power plant, the Galathea Bay transhipment port forms a major infrastructure component of the overall Great Nicobar Project.
The port is strategically important because it is located close to the East-West international shipping route and has natural water depth of over 20 meters. The project is designed to enhance India’s national security, strategic and defense presence, strengthen the islands’ economic position, and accelerate holistic development in the region.
The island has world-class ecological resources that can attract international and Indian tourists. An international airport is necessary to improve connectivity and open up the island to tourism. The island is close to international tourist destinations in Thailand and Malaysia. The new airport is expected to handle at least 1 million passengers when it opens and grow to approximately 10 million passengers per year thereafter.
