Family members, of seven fishermen onboard a fishing boat who went missing off Goa coast on December 15, 2018, led by K. Raghupati Bhat, Udupi MLA, left here for Karwar on Monday to catch a ship from there to inspect the spot where the boat went missing in the sea.
As many as seven fishermen, two from Udupi and five from Uttara Kannada district, had left from Malpe Fisheries Harbour here in a fishing boat, Suvarna Tribhuja, for fishing on December 13, 2018.
The boat with the fishermen onboard went missing in the sea off Goa coast on December 15, 2018. Though the Indian Navy conducted search operations to trace the missing boat, its efforts had not yielded any results.
A press release issued by Mr. Bhat here on Monday said that after the incident, he and Shobha Karandlaje, MP, had met Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and brought the matter of the missing fishermen to her notice.
Ms. Sitharaman herself came to Udupi and visited the families of two missing fishermen here, a month ago, and had assured them of intensifying the search operations.
It was on this occasion that the family members of the fishermen urged Ms. Sitharaman here that they too should be provided an opportunity to visit the place where the fishing boat, Suvarna Tribhuja, had gone missing.
Since the same request was made to him (Mr. Bhat), a team of family members of the missing fishermen led by him left here at 4 a.m. on Monday. They would inspect the spot, where the missing boat went missing in the sea, the release said. Gopal R.K., secretary of Malpe Fishermen’s Association, told The Hindu that the family members of the missing fishermen along with Mr. Bhat had reached the naval base, INS Kadamba, near Karwar, and from there they had boarded the hydrographic survey ship, INS Sutlej, to reach the spot, where Suvarna Tribhuja went missing. “I do not have any more information as the area is out of mobile telephone coverage range,” he said.