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51 fishermen repatriated

In return, India hands over 52 Lankans to island navy.

Chennai/Karaikal: After an ordeal of th­r­ee months, 51 fishermen from Tamil Na­du and Karaikal, who were arrested by the Lankan navy, retu­rn­ed home on Thur­sd­ay, after Indian Coast Guard (ICG) repatria­ted them.

The ICG ship Vish­wast that sailed from Chennai on Wedn­es­d­ay with 52 Lankan fi­s­hermen reached the designated position of handing and taki­ng over near international maritime bou­n­dary line (IMBL) at 11 am on Thursday.

But the Lankan na­val ship Shakthi and two other coast gu­ard ve­ssels carr­yin­g a total of 51 fishermen ar­rived only at 12.30 pm. Ponnusamy, a fis­herman from Kar­ai­kal could not return ho­me as he was hosp­it­­alised.

The reunion was em­­otional for the fis­he­rmen as their fa­mily members along with TN fisheries mi­n­ister K.A. Jayapal and Nagapattinam co­­l­lector T.K. Ponn­u­s­­amy welcomed the­m at Karaikal port.

The fishermen — 22 from Karaikal and 30 from Nagapattinam and Pudukottai districts — were arrested by the Lankan na­vy on October 16 and 20 for allegedly fishing in the Lankan wa­ters and were rem­anded to judicial custody in Trincomalee and Jaffna.

Arulselvan, one of the fishermen from Ka­raikal told this newspaper that they had suffered untold hardship inside the prison and were also denied food and other amenities. “Our survival bec­a­me a quest­ion mark and we really th­ank the Ce­n­tral go­v­er­nment for repatriating us,” he said.

However, the fishermen were upset, as their fishing boats were not returned. Ramesh Kumar, an­other fisherman said the Lankan authorities would always pr­o­mise to release them when they took them to court, but only ex­tended their remand. “We continued to fa­ce hardship in the pr­ison,” he added.

Following the talks by two countries on the fishermen issue, the concurrent repatriation of both countries fishermen took place on Thursday. ICG (east) commander IG Satya Prakash Sh­arma said the co­ast guard has been doing this repatriation on a regular basis.

( Source : dc )
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