CHENNAI: Indian Coast Guard Ship (ICGS) Sarang apprehended two Sri Lankan fishing boats with 11 crew for illegally poaching in Indian waters off Mahabalipuram coast. The boats and the crew were brought to the shore on Tuesday morning and were handed over to the local police.
According to sources, on Sunday, a Coast Guard Dornier aircraft during a routine surveillance sighted two Lankan boats fishing at 101 nautical miles off Mahabalipuram coast — an Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ). ICGS Sarang intercepted both the boats and apprehended all the 11 crew along with about 5,500 kg of fish onboard.
The Lankan boats were fitted with global positioning system (GPS) and worldwide high frequency radio communication sets and a sophisticated compass, official sources said.
Coast Guard sources told Express that the presence of such sophisticated boats operating in the Indian EEZ were a threat to the nation’s security as their involvement/collusion with forces inimical to national interests could not be ruled out.The east coast has highly sensitive installations (like the DRDO facility at Wheeler Island off Odisha, Orissa, ISRO at Sriharikota, Andhra Pradesh, and a nuclear reactor at Kalpakkam, Tamil Nadu).
Since this January 2010, the Coast Guard has apprehended 62 boats with 293 Sri Lankan crew and 17,245 kg of fish. Last year, it apprehended 103 boats, 511 crew and 84,681 kg of fish (mainly tuna) from the eastern seabed.