Eight fishermen who went deep sea fishing still untraceable

Udupi: As many as eight fishermen who went deep sea fishing have gone missing off Goa coast since December 15.

It is gathered that Chandrashekhar, Damodar, Lakshman, Satish, Ravi, Harish, Ramesh and Jogayya left for fishing on the deep sea trawler, Suvarna Tribhuja, from Malpe at 11 PM on December 13 and remained in contact with their relatives till the midnight of December 15. Later,  they went incommunicado.

Leaders from the fishermen community informed that if the boat had capsized, then the parts of the boat would have washed ashore. However, there is no trace of the boat or its parts and they suspected that the fishermen must have lost their route, therefore, have appealed to the authorities to bring them back.

Former minister Pramod Madhwaraj has spoken to Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy and DGP Neelamani Raju with this regard and has demanded constitution of a special force to trace the missing fishermen, informed sources.

Based on a complaint given by Nityananda Kotian, brother of Damodar, a missing complaint was registered at the Malpe Police Station.

The Deputy Director of Fisheries Parshwanath told that the boat had gone missing off Goa coast near Goa-Maharashtra border. They have already informed the Coast Guard in Mangaluru, which, in turn, had informed the Coast Guard in Goa, which was now making efforts to trace the boat in the sea. Normally, deep sea trawlers go fishing for about 10-15 days.