Even after 11 months, the fate of 17 fishermen of seven families of Pagadalapeta in the town, who had ventured into the sea on June 15, 2015, along with their fellow fishermen, is still not known. Their remaining untraced is making it difficult for the authorities to take a decision on paying compensation to victims. On June 15 midnight, at the end of a two-month-long ban on fishing, hundreds of mechanised boats carrying fishermen went into the sea for fishing. As misfortune would have it, a cyclone had occurred on the second day of their going into the sea forcing the boats to return to the shore. However, some boats went missing. As a result 17 fishermen still remained untraced. To be eligible to get insurance benefits, either bodies of dead fishermen should be found or their whereabouts should be known. Soon after the incident, people’s representatives and the district machinery promised a compensation of Rs 5 lakh to each bereaved family. But not a single paisa was paid towards compensation citing rules. Immediately, after the incident, a few kg of rice and minor succour by NGOs was extended. Later, YSRCP president YS Jaganmohan Reddy paid a compensation of Rs 50,000 to each family. Women from the seven families are virtually reduced to tears not knowing how to sustain the families in the absence of payment of compensation by the government. The affected families say that their lives have undergone a drastic change since the incident. Of the seven families, two families had migrated to Yanam to live with their relatives. The affected families expected that Minister Kollu Ravindra and MLA Vanamadi Kondababu, who also hail from fishermen community, will come to their rescue, but in vain. On the directions of Vanamadi, a three-member committee submitted a report to the government, copies of which were circulated to fisheries and disaster management departments. The victims were eagerly awaiting succour from the government. They sought the government to relax the rules in the fishermen missing cases. Meanwhile, the CPM leaders are gearing up to launch an agitation if justice was not done to the fishermen’s families.
2016 Hyderabad Media House Limited/The Hans India.