Staff Correspondent
Baratang, Aug 05: The fiber boat operators of Middle Andaman’s Baratang region have threatened to go for an indefinite hunger strike against the stringent safety norms of Administration, which makes IRS survey compulsory, even for small fiber boats.
The main concern of Fiber boat operators of Baratang is reduction of capacity of the seats in the fiber boats after IRS survey, in fact the matter is hanging on fire since last one year but no proper solution has been found till date by the Administration, allege boat operators.
According to Baratang fiber boat owners if a survey is done the capacity of all boats will be reduced to 50 percent and hence the earning of boat owners will reduce and it will also increase the boat fare for visiting tourist due capacity reduction.
“Due to capacity reduction there will be an increase in the rates of boat tickets for tourists, for which we are actually not at all in favour because it will create disputes between us and local travel agents as well as tourists. But we will have to do this to minimize the loss due to capacity reduction,” the president of Baratang Tourist Fiber Boat Owners Association, Mr G Sanju told Andaman Sheekha today.
The fiber boat operators have other major agendas too, the agitating boat owners are also requesting the administration to provide some kind of subsidy as it was promised earlier by the administration under replacement scheme for fiber boats.
The boat operators are also demanding appointment of a Naval architect so that no one can misguide them or blackmail them in technical side while Survey.
The operators also allege that administration does not have a proper place for conducting IRS survey in Andaman.
Many other operators allege that before 2014 tourist boat tragedy, which killed around 21 tourists, near Ross Island, after IRS survey the seating capacity was not reduced in many cases but now the administration is telling them that the seating capacity will be reduced to 50 percent after IRS Survey.
Talking to Andaman Sheekha, the President of BRFBOA said that if the administration does not take any appropriate steps to solve this problem the Baratang Tourist Fiber Boat Owners Association will go for an indefinite hunger strike from 10 August 2015 at Baratang Island of Middle Andaman.
Baratang is one of the major hotspots for visiting tourists in Andaman. Located nearly 100 KM away from Port Blair the Baratang Island has Mud Volcano, Lime Stone Caves and Parrot Island, which attract thousands of tourists everyday.
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