Voluntary sea guards to stop Indian poachers

The Fisheries Ministry has presented a Cabinet Memorandum seeking to establish a civilian voluntary force called “sea guards” to monitor Indian fishermen's frequent illegal bottom trawling in Sri Lanka's northern territorial waters.

Fisheries Minister Douglas Devananda told the Sunday Times that the Ministry submitted the memorandum for Cabinet approval as a move to deter Indian fishermen from entering the country’s waters for bottom trawling and destroying the nets of Northern fishermen.

"The role of the sea guards is more about monitoring and assisting the Navy’s ongoing initiative to prevent Indian fishermen from coming into our waters,” the Minister said.

Members of the fisherfolk community will be recruited to the voluntary force through North-based Fishermen Unions, according to the Minister.

The frequent entry of Indian trawlers, almost daily nowadays, into Sri Lanka's territorial waters in large numbers and massive fishing boats, hindering the fishing activities of local fishermen, has impacted the livelihood of the fishing community as a whole.

The Cabinet memorandum notes that at least 500 Indian bottom trawlers enter Sri Lankan territorial waters and engage in bottom trawling daily, with each mechanised trawler boat catching about 1,000 kg of fish and prawns from northern waters.

The daily colossal loss to Sri Lanka as a result of this illegal trawling is estimated to be around Rs. 350 million. At least three days a week, an average of 900 Indian trawlers enter the northern waters, the Cabinet memorandum observed, while stressing that those trawlers not only catch fish and prawns but also sweep the juveniles, which they dump into the sea at the port of landing.

On Friday, the Navy arrested fifteen Indian fishermen for engaging in bottom trawling in northern waters near Karainagar, Jaffna, along with a trawler.

So far, a total of sixteen Indian poaching trawlers and 125 Indian fishermen have been taken into custody this year, according to the Navy.