Karwar: Minister for Ports, Fisheries, Inland Transport and Muzrai Kota Srinivas Poojari said that soon, a meeting will be convened to discuss the issue of second phase expansion of the Karwar commercial port with the officials.
Speaking after lending ears to the suggestions and opinions of fishermen leaders, experts and officials over the port expansion issue in Karwar on Tuesday, Poojari said that the fishermen feel that they
would lose the port if the Sagarmala project was implemented. There were also fears that the fishermen’s ‘rights’ on the sea would be curbed and the beach would be destroyed. “However, fishermen need not worry. Plans to execute the Sagarmala project would be made while protecting the interest of the fishermen,” Poojari said.
Prior to this, Port Officer Captain Swamy said that the proposed Sagarmala project would cost Rs 274 crore. Under this, 880 metre sea wall will be constructed and the jetty will be expanded by 250 metre. “Ports in Karnataka handle not even 10 lakh metric tonnes cargo per year. This is very less compared to the other States. Therefore, there are plans to convert Karwar port into a full-fledged port so that it benefits fishermen and other commercial operations,” he said.
Fears expressed
Fishermen leader K T Tandel said that the fishing port of Karwar was already congested and expansion of the commercial port would create more problems. Therefore, the project must be dropped.
He added that the commercial and fishing ports in Karwar were not separate and some day, the fishing port might be suspended stating security reasons. To house big ships, the movement of fishing boats might be restricted.
Senior marine biology scientist V N Nayak said that the fish stocks was sufficient from Baithkhol area to the Kali river. Therefore, the number of fishermen staying in that stretch was also more. In case, the seawall is constructed there, the fishermen would be displaced from there.
Fishermen leader Ganapathi Mangre said that during land acquisition for the Seabird navy base, it was assured to provide passes for fishing in the navy base limits. But that assurance was not kept. Now, the fishermen are not allowed to go on fishing there. A similar thing might happen with Sagarmala expansion project also.
Meanwhile, MLA Roopali Naik questioned those opposing port expansion project as to why they did not object to the project when former chief minister Siddaramaiah laid the foundation stone for the port expansion work on Rabindranath Tagore beach on December 6, 2017.
‘Why oppose now?’
She later said that the project must not be anti-fishermen. Saving the seashore was the responsibility of local elected representatives and authorities and a discussion would be held in this regard.
Fishermen's opposition
While the meeting was in progress, hundreds of fishermen gathered in front of the deputy commissioner's office gate and raised slogans against the project. After the meeting, Minister Kota Srinivas Poojari met the fishermen and asked them not to fear and their interest would be protected. However, the fishermen once again held a meeting and decided to continue their protest against the project.
Deputy Commissioner K Harishkumar, ZP CEP Mohammad Roshan, Additional Deputy Commissioner Nagaraj Singrer, officials of various departments, fishermen leaders and others attended the meeting.