Indian sailor stranded in Great Yarmouth for 15 months amid pay row

An Indian sailor has been stranded for more than a year on a ship moored at a British port amid an ongoing legal dispute.

The Malaviya Twenty was detained in Great Yarmouth, in Norfolk, after the Indian owners of the ship went into liquidation following its arrival at the port in June 2016.

Captain Nikesh Rastogi was part of a 13-strong replacement crew for the vessel contracted the following February. However, his employers withdrew from operating the ship this January - leaving him unpaid.

The International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) says a total 33 crew members are still waiting to get their wages after working on the ship at various times since October 2015.

Marine workers who believe they are owed money can apply to the admiralty division of the High Court for a vessel to be “arrested”. The ITF did just that in November 2016, after the  Malaviya Twenty crew lodged complaints.

The union secured $688,000 (£515,000) for the asset’s release to manning agents acting for Indian bank ICICI. That sum was believed to be enough to pay everyone involved and to repatriate Rastogi, and three other crew members who joined him in September, the BBC reports.

However, ITF inspector Paul Keenan says the Great Yarmouth port, which is also owed unpaid dues, is “using legislation from the 19th century” to demand three times the amount it is owed.

In the meantime, Rastogi, from Mumbai, has to stay on the Malaviya Twenty in order to avoid it being declared a derelict vessel, which he says would prevent him and his three remaining crew members from getting their pay.

“If I were to get off the ship with everybody else, the vessel is considered a derelict which means anybody can take it over,” Rastogi explained.

The Independent reports that he and his men spend much of their time “doing routine maintenance and performing drills”, and keep in touch with their families via WhatsApp.