TheCari people, orChariar, were one of the ten indigenousGreat Andamanese peoples, originally living on the northernmost part ofNorth Andaman Island and onLandfall Island in theIndian Ocean.
The Cari spoke a distinctive dialect,Akachari, closely related to the other dialects of theNorthern Andamanese language. They were exclusively shore-dwellers (aryoto).[1]
The Cari population at the time of first European contacts (in the 1790s) has been estimated at 100 individuals, out of perhaps 3500 Great Andamanese.[2]Like otherAndamanese peoples, the Cari were decimated during colonial and post-colonial times, by diseases,alcohol, colonial warfare and loss of territory. The population was down to 39 individuals in the 1901 census, falling to 36 in 1911, 17 in 1921, and 9 in 1931.[3]
In 1949 any remaining Cari were relocated, together with all other surviving Great Andamanese, to a reservation onBluff island; and then again in 1969 to a reservation onStrait Island.[4]
By 1994, the population was reduced to only two women, aged 57 and 59, and therefore was on its way to extinction.[3] They are a designatedScheduled Tribe.[5]
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