Rahul Singh & Vikramaditya
Port Blair, Nov 02: The Fishermen community of Campbell Bay today staged a protest against operation of fishing trawlers in the Great Nicobar region and non availability of ice blocks for the fishermen community of the Island.
Talking to Andaman Sheekha Daily, protesting fishermen pointed out that a 25 Ton fishing trawler has been brought to Campbell Bay for the purpose of catching fish in large quantity. They mentioned that it is still not clear whether the registration of the said fishing trawler has been done by the vessel owner, however, the vessel has reached to Campbell Bay and has been given anchorage permission close to Marine Hard jetty of Campbell Bay from Port Management Board.
“Altogether 50 individual fishermen from our community have registered themselves under fisheries department are literally scared of losing their livelihood due to the arrival of fishing trawler at Campbell Bay, as per the reliable sources the fishing trawler is a 25 Ton capacity vessel, and in order to preserve the catch the trawler will require large quantity of Ice Blocks from cold storage which will not be sufficient for other fishermen of our community if the required number of ice blocks will be provided to fishing trawler, since the capacity of present cold storage of fisheries department is 200 ice blocks it is also reported from our community that the present number of ice blocks prepared at cold storage Campbell Bay is barely sufficient for existing smaller boat owner of our community. It’s a matter of great concern for all of us if in the coming days the said fishing trawler will venture into sea for fishing and in order to preserve the catch the trawler require more than 200 ice blocks at a time causing immense scarce of ice blocks for other fishermen who have already reporting of insufficient supply from cold storage,” said one fisherman.
As per details, the protest began this morning and till now no officials from Administration have contacted them to listen to their grievances.
“If the administration wants to commercialize fishing, then please send us back to our mainland. If our problems are not solved we will organise major protest and will block all roads of Great Nicobar Island until we get justice,” Mr. Purushottam added.
