Jayalalithaa writes to Manmohan Singh?seeking instant action

Chennai: Chief mi­nister Jayalalithaa on Thursday lambasted Ce­ntre for what she termed “facile do not touch policy” over the arrest of Indian fishermen by Sri Lankan navy, and asked Prime Minister Manm­ohan Singh to personally take up the matter with Lankan President Mah­inda Rajapaksa.

Referring to the arrest of 140 fishermen in the last two days, she desc­ribed them as “the largest and most outrageous acts of mass abduction” by the Sri Lankan navy, and slammed such “warlike acts”, saying it could not have been carried out without the “tacit support” of Colombo.

“The entire fishing community in TN has lost its faith in the ability of the government of India to protect the lives and livelihood of innocent fishermen in the high seas. Surely, we ca­nnot continue our fa­cile ‘do not touch policy’ in the face of these audacious and high handed acts that violate the lives and livelihoods of our fishermen anymore,” she said in a letter to Singh.

She expressed hope that Centre would “wake up to the reality of the situation,” and come up with a concrete course of action to resolve the issue.

“The Lankan High Comm­issi­oner in New Delhi must be summoned to the ministry of external aff­airs and our strong protest lodged. Prime Mi­nister, Sir, you must personally take up this issue with the President of Sri Lanka without any further delay,” she urged.

She expressed fears that failure to take immediate action could be disastr­ous for fishermen’s livel­ihood and could also flare up socio-economic tensions with the potential to snowball into a major law and order and security issue.

But for the restraint showed by fishermen, avoiding a direct conflict with the ‘heavily armed’ Lankan Navy personnel, many innoc­ent lives could have been lost when over 300 of th­em were arrested, she said.

She said 110 fishermen in 15 boats “quietly surrendered” to the Lankan Navy, while 32 boats with 215 fishermen turned ba­ck and returned.

She charged the Lankan Navy with acting with “ext­reme hostility and punitive intent.”