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PORT BLAIR, ANDAMANS, October 27, 2004: Under the British raj, the islands of Andaman and Nicobar began as a colony for convicts. Many of today’s islanders are descendants of those very convicts. But interestingly the old penal colony has left behind a very homogenous society, where caste, creed and communal tension find absolutely no space. The serene island was once the hostile kalapaani. The first political prisoners of the Sepoy Mutiny were brought here and well into the 20th century the flow of prisoners continued. But the British allowed some of the prisoners to live and work outside the jails on the island. Thrown together, those single men and women were soon overtaken by a desire to marry. Given the limitations, caste, religion and language barriers broke down paving the way for inter-caste marriages. “People just did not give importance to who I am, where I came from, who my ancestors were. People in those times simply got married,” said Meshak, resident.



Threatened by an impending Japanese invasion of the islands in 1942, the British offered to take the Indian prisoners back to the mainland. But a majority of them refused as they knew their families would never accept their marriage. The caste-less roots of Andaman society were firmly planted and even today, there are several families with Muslims, Hindus and Christians all part of the same unit. “I was born in a Muslim family and my husband is a Pandit. We liked each other, he asked his parents, I asked my mother and brothers, they all agreed and we got married,” said Bishnu Pada Ray, resident. These islanders are completely immune to the communal fissures emerging on the mainland and inter-caste marriages that began as a necessity are today a way of life and they would like to keep it that way.

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