All the missing fishermen on the ill fated trawler OceanFisher-II were not locals. Fishermen from other parts, mostly from Kerala, Tamil Nadu, or Koppal (North Karnataka) take risks. "Locals know the conditions during September and hardly venture into the sea,'' says deputy director of fisheries Suresh Kumar Ullal. Fishing due to its lucrative nature now has assumed more of a business form than a profession.
Of the 1,015 mechanized multi-day fishing vessels, 30-33% is owned by businessmen, who are not in this profession. Vessels/ trawlers are rented out for a fixed sum or a percentage of the catch to a known person like in the case of Ocean Fisher II, who hires deck hands at the port, mostly outsiders. According to sources these boats have just one life jacket and one buoy.
The boats do not inform the fisheries department when they venture into the sea nor give the details of the deck hands they have. "It will be very difficult to identify who is missing until the kin of the missing inform us,'' says Suresh Kumar. In case of death, each fisherman, from or outside state who went on a local boat, gets Rs 50,000 as compensation from sate relief fund. The compensation is Rs 1 lakh if he is a fishermen society member. The boat which capsized on Thursday was built in 1980, was 14.3 mts in length and cost Rs 35 lakh.