HC seeks Centre's response on PIL to protect fishermen's rights

Chennai: The Madras High Court on Friday directed the Centre to reply within four weeks to a petition seeking a direction to secure the traditional rights of fishermen and protect their livelihood. 

A division bench of Justices S Manikumar and Subramonium Prasad issued notice to the Ministry of Environment and Forests, and the Department of Animal Husbandry Dairy and Fisheries on a public interest litigation petition by Fishermen care, an organisation protecting rights of fisherfolk. It also directed the Centre to file its reply within four weeks. 

The petitioner claimed that many families living in fishing hamlets for centuries had been evicted for setting up information technology companies and industries. 

It also submitted that commercialisation of the 'no development zone' has led to environmental pollution, resulting in a dip in fishery resources and that the fishermen had to take up deep-sea fishing for their survival. 

The petitioner alleged that coastal areas, where the fishermen community has been living for generations and berthing their boats and drying their nets, were used for rampant mining of sand. 

The Fishermen's care noted that a report of a committee headed by Agriculture Scientist M S Swaminanthan was submitted to the Union Ministry for Environment and Forests on July 16, 2009, recommending a separate piece of legislation like the Traditional Forest Dwellers Act, 2006, for securing the traditional rights of fishermen and their families. 

As there was no action taken on the report, the petitioner had applied for an RTI and the ministry replied that no separate law for protection of traditional rights and interest of fishermen and coastal community has been enacted by it on the basis of recommendations of the committee.