34 fishermen from Bengal's Kakdwip detained in Bangladesh

Kolkata, July 15 (IANS) As many as 34 fishermen, mostly hailing from the coastal belt of Kakdwip in South 24 Parganas district of West Bengal, have been detained by the Bangladesh administration after their fishing trawlers allegedly crossed the international waters and entered the neighbouring country's coastline.

As per information communicated to the West Bengal government, the incident took place late on the night of July 13, and the matter was communicated to the Indian and the West Bengal administration officially by the Bangladesh government on Tuesday morning.

Because of darkness coupled with bad weather conditions, two fishing trawlers, namely “FB-Jhar” and “FB-Mangalchandi, lost direction and inadvertently crossed the International Maritime Boundary Line and entered the Bangladesh waters, said a state government official.

After that, the 34 fishermen were detained by the Bangladesh Navy along with the two fishing trawlers.

As per the latest information available with the state administration, the 34 fishermen along with the two fishing trawlers were nabbed at a distance of 77 nautical miles from Bangladesh’s Mongla Port Fairway Buoy.

An office-bearer of the Sundarban Deep-sea Fishermen Workers’ Union said that, as far as the last information available to them, although being detained, the 34 fishermen were not facing any difficulty there. “The state administration has already started the process of ensuring the return of the detained fishermen to the state,” the union representative said.

“In the changed political situation in Bangladesh, both the administration as well as our union had been regularly cautioning the fishermen going for deep-sea fishing to be extremely cautious with regards to remaining within the Indian water. But still, mistakes happen at times either because of the darkness or because of the bad weather, as it happened in this case,” the union representative said.

Meanwhile, an official from the state fisheries department said that the office of the Indian High Commission in Dhaka has also been contacted, and the latter had requested to initiate talks with the Bangladeshi administration immediately to ensure the return of the detained fishermen.

--IANS

src/dpb