Administration
Politically, Car Nicobar is a tehsil, roughly equivalent to a county in its range of administrative powers. The tehsil of Nancowry administers all the other Nicobar islands. The administrative capital is near the Indian Air Force station known as 'Headquarters' which is the largest junction in this small island with some shops, a hospital, a bank, a post office, the police head quarters and some government offices.
Although the area of Car Nicobar is less than 7% of the area of the Nicobar group, in the census of 2011 its population of 20,292 was more than half of the total Nicobar population.
There were 15 villages, namely:
- Ha-nyôch (Mus)
- Töt-chak (Kinmai)
- Tö-kuö-nö Sē-ti (Small Lapathy)
- Tö-ki-röng Sē-ti (Big Lapathy)
- Höng-chu (Tapoiming)
- Pum-pai (Chukchucha)
- Sa-rā-ki (Kinyuka)
- Tim-lö (Tamalu)
- Kè-è-rô (Perka)
- U-rèk-ka (Malacca)
- Sa-pë-ha (Kakana)
- Öt-ra-höön (Kimius)
- Ha-ran (Arong)
- Öt-ka-sip (Sawai)
- Rit-töp (Titop)
The names in brackets are often used for tourists and other outsiders, as the local names in Nicobarese are difficult for outsiders to pronounce.
Each village has a tuhet meaning elderly heads, the number of which varies. From each of these elders three are elected as 1st, 2nd, and 3rd captain to look after the day-to-day affairs of the village.
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