Vikramaditya
Port Blair, Dec 02: While people of Nicobar District are suffering a lot due to remoteness, the Directorate of Shipping Services seems to be struggling to keep ships seaworthy.
According to reports presently only two ships out of the seven ships are capable to sail to Nicobar District but as the MV Coral Queen ship has been scheduled for Swaraj Dweep, there is only ship, MV Bharat Seema, presently available for Nicobar District.
According to highly placed sources, presently MV Kalighat is out of service because of APS, MV Campbell Bay also gone for APS, MV Sentinel is under repair, MV Chowra is in Dry Dock and MV Sindhu is not sailing for various known and unknown reasons as well as two master conflict.
Shortage of ships is also causing bagful of troubles for people of North and Middle Andaman, especially patients, who have to use the pathetic Andaman Trunk Road to reach Port Blair.
Surprisingly even after repeated attempts top officials of DSS were unavailable for a comment in this regard. Even the officials did not respond to mobile calls made by Andaman Sheekha Daily reporter to cross verify this issue.
It seems that the Director Shipping Services, under whose command the shipping service is in pitiable condition, thinks that he is not answerable to anyone.
People of Nicobar District are now requesting the Chief Secretary of Andaman and Nicobar Administration to intervene in this matter and direct the DSS to work for immediate repair of MV Sentinel and MV Campbell Bay, so that three ships remain available for Nicobar District.
