E Arun & Tarun Kartick
Port Blair: Feb 18: M.V Kalighat, an asset of Andaman and Nicobar Administration, is a 400 Pax cum 100 Tones Cargo Vessel originally built by Hooghly Dock and Port Engineers Limited, Kolkata.
The Ship was delivered by its builders after an emergency SOS received by them from The Andaman and Nicobar Administration after the devastating Tsunami of 26th Dec 2004. The vessel was immediately deployed onto service after that to cope up with the disaster.
It has been just eight years that this ship stated its journey of providing services to the Islanders but today its condition is more devastating than the Tsunami itself.
The Air-Conditioning system of the ship is not working and the authorities are running the ship at reduced speeds because of which the Islanders are in great distress.
As of today MV Kalighat sails for Car Nicobar, Nancowry and Campbell Bay regularly without a working Air- Conditioning system. The AC of the ship had started giving troubles to the travelers since a long time and it finally stopped working one day, after which the ship is being continually pressed into service without AC.
MV Kalighat’s ventilation system was originally designed to work with Air-Conditioning System and without a proper air-conditioning system its ventilation system is also almost a failure. Travelers who don’t have another option have to travel by this ship even today bearing all the heat that is inside the cabins and bunk spaces.
Commuters are distressed and MV Kalighat is like torture cell to them today in which they never want to step again. Sources have informed that people find it comfortable to sleep at ship’s deck rather than in their cabins and bunks.
During night time one can see almost all passengers roaming or sleeping on the ship’s deck because of the unbearable heat inside the suffocating chambers of the ship. Whenever it rains outside the only option with the commuters to sleep on the Decks’s is also taken away from them by nature and anyhow they spend their nights in the suffocating and breathtaking ship.
“It is very difficult for us to travel by this ship and if we are becoming so restless then I wonder how patients manage to travel by this ship.” said a traveler who traveled in MV Kalighat recently.
It’s being so long since the AC of the ship is not working but the Administration and its department, the Directorate of Shipping Services seems to be taking it very lightly and troubling the general public of these Islands. DSS is pressing this ship into service continuously with the warning in their schedule notifications that the Ship’s Air Conditioning system is out of order, just by intimating the general public about the non- functioning of the AC, the DSS thinks that his responsibility of over. The Administration has to do something in this regard to solve people’s problem and to bring the valuable asset of our islands in complete order. The authorities responsible should immediately take some remedial measures to get the AC in working condition.
In last seven day Andaman Sheekha correspondent tried to meet the Director of Shipping Services and the Assistant Director of Shipping Services for atleast dozens of time but they were always inaccessible. It was found that even during visiting hours they were unavailable in their chambers. It seems that no one in Directorate of Shipping Services is ready to reply to public’s questions.
