In the height of 21st century there is a community that lives totally isolated from the rest of the world. They are hostile to any foreign contact and if someone from outside approaches, is likely to being killed and an arrow shot. What is known today about Sentinelese, a tribe that doesn't dominate the fire and that rejects any contact with the outside?
Before, don't forget to subscribe to Un Mundo Inmenso or activate notifications. During the last decades humanity has lived a revolution in communications. This makes us to stay connected all the time with what happens in each place of the world and that the ways of life in different countries are more and more similar.
However, there is a place that is oblivious to this. It is North Sentinel, an island located in the Gulf of Bengal, between the continental territory of India and Thailand. Administratively it is considered to belong to India, although later you will realize why do we doubt this claim.
The island has almost 60 square kilometers of surface. Geographically it is part of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands archipelago, that belong to India. North Sentinel is one of the most enigmatic places of these days.
It is that very little is known of those who live there. It is believed that there are between 50 and 400 people, who are descendants of the first inhabitants of the Earth, which emigrated from Africa to this island. In fact, its physical characteristics are typical of the Africans and not of Indians or from people in Southeast Asia, more geographically close.
It is even believed, that the Sentinelese arrived to this island from Africa more than 60,000 years ago and since then remain isolated. To have an idea, the last glaciation ended 12,000 years ago and the pyramid of Cheops is about 4500 years old. That is, the ancestors of these people lived really a long time ago.
But almost everything about this tribe is a great mystery. We don't know their language or how they called themselves. In fact, the Sentinelese name was put from outside.
They are believed to be hunter harvesters, who feed on the fruits that grow on the island and the animals that are there, but they are not farmers. Nor are they capable of generating fire, but they can control it if it is generated in some way. For these characteristics it is considered that they live in a similar way as most human beings did before the Neolithic period.
Although, in reality, they live with microchips and spaceships. But why it is known so little about this civilization? The truth is that they show hostility to those who come closer.
The last time they were world famous was in 2018, when an American missionary wanted to take them his religion. After some attempts to establish friendly bond, it all ended up in the worst way: John Allen Chau was killed, as believed by arrow shots. For many, this person committed a great error, since he had many notices about the risk of what he was trying.
It was even illegal what he did, since it is not allowed to get to North Sentinel Island. To do it, he paid some fishermen to get him get closer. Chau's was not an isolated case, since in 2006 two fishermen were killed after getting too close to the island.
Two years earlier, in 2004, the Indian government had sent a helicopter to the area to see how a tsunami had affected the island. Not only did the Sentinelese survived, but they received the helicopter with more arrow shots. At present, India established that it is illegal to be less than three miles away of the island.
This law has a dual purpose: in one side, avoid cases like Chau's and that the islanders do not kill any intruders. But on the other, protects the Sentinelese themselves. Is that by their own isolation they have a very poorly developed immune system, so any contact with the outside world would be very risky.
Likewise, there were other relevant contacts of the Sentinelese with foreigners. At the end of the 19th century, Maurice Portman, a British military, did it, who would have achieved a relatively fluid bond. .
At that time, they took four Sentinelese to Port Blair, the capital of the Andaman Islands. The two adults died quickly, it is supposed that they didn't have enough immunity. The two children returned to North Sentinel with gifts for the locals.
Some speculate that those two children could have taken diseases to the island, which would explain the hostility that was generated then to foreigners. A century later there was another meeting that got attention. In 1981, a Hong Kong ship ran aground in front of the coast of the island.
The crew of the ship did not go down, since they warned that the locals did not welcome them. They were rescued by helicopter, and it is believed that the Sentinelese wanted to board the ship. The rest of the ship can currently be seen in Google Earth.
Even the material of that ship was used by the Sentinelese to improve their weapons. That's why some consider the arrival of that freighter allowed them to move from the Stone Age to the Iron Age. However, the contemporary that dedicated the most to establish contact with this town was Triloknath Pandit.
In 1991, after many years of work, He got to be received in peace. He took them coconuts and had a few minutes of approach. In fact, these are the best images that exist of the Sentinelese, and they are almost 30 years old.
Similarly, Pandit confessed years later that he regretted trying to make these approaches. He also did it with other nearby people, like the Jarawa. The fate of the other tribes was tragic.
They were exposed to diseases, they became dependents when they were before self-sustaining and even exploited, becoming a tourist attraction. Survival NGO fights for survival of indigenous peoples and has denounced the problems of the Jarawas after their contact with the outside. On the Sentinelese, Survival's position it's clear: this tribe showed that wants to stay isolated, so it is must to respect that position and that right.
Should the will of the islanders be respected? Or would it be nice to try a new contact? Finally we want to also propose a new dilemma.
On the political maps this island appears as part of India. In fact, this country considers it its territory and establishes a certain protectorate over Sentinelese. But in reality Indian laws do not apply there.
And if Sentinelese kill a visitor they will not be judged by the Indian authorities. In addition, the people are the ones who exercise sovereignty and govern themselves. And not only they don't considered themselves as part of India, but they don't know what this country is, or what a country is?
So is it correct that we continue to consider North Sentinel part of India, or is it an external look that has little to do with what happens there? Leave your comment below.
