Hope in the horizon

Is there an end in sight to the fishing row?:

by Special Correspondent

The vexatious and seemingly unending fishing row between Sri Lanka and India now appears to be heading towards a solution, although a definite settlement is still a far cry.

However, some recent developments on both sides of the Palk Strait have given rise to the hope.

To take the changes on the Indian side first: Perhaps for the first in the history of interactions between an Indian External Affairs Minister and fishermen from Tamil Nadu and Puducherry, the present Minister, Sushma Swaraj, told the fishermen categorically, that they should not cross the International Maritime Boundary Line (IMBL).

If they did, they would have to face the consequences, she warned. Swaraj was virtually endorsing the arrest of intruding fishermen and the impounding of their boats by the Sri Lankan authorities. The Minister advised the fishermen to go for deep sea fishing instead.

Delhi's stance

Casting the net, far and wide

Therefore, when she assured the fishermen that the Indian government would find a "lasting solution" to their problem, she had just two things at the back of her mind: First, getting the fishermen to avoid Sri Lankan waters; Second, enabling them to take to deep sea fishing.

Earlier, during the last fishermen's talks in Chennai, S.P.Anthonymuthu of the Indo-Lanka Fishermen's Forum had warned the Indian delegation that getting Indian fishermen released from Sri Lankan jails will not be easy once the 19 Amendment of the Sri Lankan constitution, curtailing the Executive President's discretionary powers, is passed.

Swaraj's forthright talk did elicit hostile responses from political parties in Tamil Nadu. They described her warning about "facing consequences" as "shocking".

But the responses from the fishermen themselves were muted.N.Devadas, President of the Rameswaram Fishermen's Association said that punishment for crossing the IMBL is only to be expected.

M.A.Sumanthiran

Vidya Nathaniel

" Don't cops here in India, book motorists for crossing the median line on the road or for breaking the one-way rule?" he asked.

U.Arulanandam, President of the Alliance for the Release of Innocent Fishermen, only regretted that the Indian Minister did not say that she would press Sri Lanka to accept the demand for permission to fish for 83 days in a year for three years.

Devadas approvingly noted that the Tamil Nadu Government had asked the Government of India in 2014, to give it Indian Rupees (INR) 9.7 billion to enable coastal fishermen to take to deep sea fishing.

"Initially, 175 of us are to get financial aid for the switch over. A deep sea boat costs INR 6 million. We'll get 50 percent of this as grant, which is reasonable.

However, we do not know when we will receive the money," he said.Significantly, the generally vociferous movement in Tamil Nadu to get fishermen held in Sri Lanka released, seems to have lost steam.

Thirty seven fishermen from Tamil Nadu have been in custody in Sri Lanka since March 3, but till date, there has been no hue and cry in Tamil Nadu over this.

This may be partly due to the fact that the Tamil firebrand, J.Jayalalithaa, is no longer Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. With the on-going court case against her taking a turn for the worse, she is unlikely to be a leading light of Tamil Nadu politics, at least, for sometime to come.

Changes in Sri Lanka

In Sri Lanka itself, remarkable changes have taken place. The Tamil National Alliance (TNA), the dominant party in the Northern Province which is most affected by poachers from India, has begun taking up the Sri Lankan fishermen's cause.

For all these years, the TNA had been turning a blind eye to the plight of the Northern Tamil fishermen because it did not want to antagonise Tamil Nadu politicians who had been raising their voice in support of Sri Lankan Tamils. But with parliamentary elections approaching, and with the Northern Tamil fishermen getting more and more vociferous, the TNA is now wanting to win over the fishermen and prevent them from voting for the Eelam Peoples' Democratic Party (EPDP) which has been supporting them from the beginning, or for the United National Party (UNP) which is now trying to woo them.

UNP leader and Prime Minister, Ranil Wickremesinghe, had made a good impression on the Northern fishermen when he told the popular SUN TV channel in Tamil Nadu, that intruding fishermen will be shot.

Taking the TNA's pro-fishermen stand further, M.A.Sumanthiran MP, introduced a bill in the Sri Lankan Parliament last month to ban bottom trawling in Sri Lanka. The bill prescribes punishments for defying the ban. Ban had to be called for because Sri Lanka could not raise a hue and cry about the depredations of the Indian bottom trawlers, if bottom trawling was not banned in the island itself.

Bottom trawling

Sumanthiran's stand accords with the Northern Tamil stand, which is that Tamil Nadu and Puducherry fishermen may fish in North Sri Lankan waters if they do not use destructive methods of fishing like bottom trawling. Fishermen from the two sides see each other as "brothers" who have been fishing together in the Palk Bay and Palk Strait for centuries. The idea is to fish jointly using environmentally friendly methods of fishing. Details of the joint use of resources can be discussed, they say.

In a recent paper, Vidya Nathaniel of the Colombo-based Verite Research has argued that Sri Lanka has to legally ban bottom trawling, for making a cast iron case against the large scale and extremely destructive bottom trawling being done by Indian intruders.

As on date, bottom trawling can be done by Sri Lankans and foreigners with a license from the Department of Fisheries under the Fisheries and Aquatic Resources Act 2 of 1996. The Act prohibits some methods of fishing, but not bottom trawling, she points out.

Under Art. 193 of the UN Convention on Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) Sri Lanka can take steps to protect its marine resources. UNCLOS could therefore be used to justify a ban on bottom trawling, Nathaniel says.

But there is a local political dimension which has to be borne in mind and that is the existence of an influential Sri Lankan bottom trawler owners' lobby, she warns. This lobby is likely to oppose the ban because it may be dreaming of stepping into the shoes of the withdrawing Indians.