Such attacks have resulted in injury and death. The islanders have been observed shooting arrows at boats, as well as at low-flying helicopters. The Sentinelese have repeatedly attacked approaching vessels, whether the boats were intentionally visiting the island or simply ran aground on the surrounding coral reef. In November 2018, the government's home ministry stated that the relaxation of the prohibition on visitations was intended to allow researchers and anthropologists (with pre-approved clearance) to finally visit the Sentinel islands. In 2018, the Government of India excluded 29 islands – including North Sentinel – from the Restricted Area Permit (RAP) regime, in a major effort to boost tourism. In practice, Indian authorities recognise the islanders' desire to be left alone, restricting outsiders to remote monitoring (by boat and sometimes air) from a reasonably safe distance the Indian government will not prosecute the Sentinelese for killing people in the event that an outsider ventures ashore. Nominally, the island belongs to the South Andaman administrative district, part of the Indian union territory of Andaman and Nicobar Islands. The area is patrolled by the Indian Navy. The Andaman and Nicobar Islands Protection of Aboriginal Tribes Act of 1956 prohibits travel to the island, and any approach closer than 5 nautical miles (9.3 km), in order to protect the remaining tribal community from 'mainland' infectious diseases against which they (likely) have no acquired immunity.

It is home to the Sentinelese, an indigenous people in voluntary isolation who have defended, often by force, their protected isolation from the outside world. Sources from within his missionary circle told AP that Mr Chau interacted with some of the tribesmen, who stand about 1.6m tall and wear yellow paste on their faces, on a handful of occasions.North Sentinel Island is one of the Andaman Islands, an Indian archipelago in the Bay of Bengal which also includes South Sentinel Island. “I hope this isn’t one of my last notes but if it is ‘to God be the Glory’.” “Why does this beautiful place have to have so much death here?” he wrote. In Instagram posts and journals, Mr Chau wrote that he found the remote Sentinel Island in the Bay of Bengal - where people live as their ancestors did thousands of years ago - an inspiring but frightening location, the publication reported. “You guys might think I’m crazy in all this but I think it’s worthwhile to declare Jesus to these people,” he wrote in a last note to his family on November 16, shortly before he left the safety of the fishing boat to meet the tribesmen on the island. American missionary John Allen Chau had written that he didn’t want to die, hours before a remote tribe on India’s North Sentinel Island killed him in a hail of arrows.Īlthough the island, a sovereign area under Indian protection, is a no-go-zone, the American missionary had plans on making contact with the Sentinelese tribe according to his journals shared by his mother with The Washington Post.

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