The Tamil Nadu coast turned tense on Friday morning following the arrest of 86 fishermen from the State on Thursday night by the Sri lankan Navy. The fishermen along with ten trawlers were taken into custody of the Sri lankan Navy off the Mullaitivu coast in the northern province of the island nation.
This is the first "attack" on Tamil Nadu fishermen following the State visit of Sri lankan president Mythripala Sirisena to India early this month. There was a lull in the attacks on Tamil Nadu fishermen fishing in their "traditional waters" following the Presidential election in Sri lanka in January which saw the defeat of incumbent president Mahinda Rajapaksa.
In the run up to the visit of Sirisena to India, there was a lot of expectation among the fishermen community in Tamil Nadu that the attacks by the Sri lankan Navy would come down. The scheduled meeting between the fishermen of Tamil Nadu and Sri lanka proposed to be held at Chennai during the first week of March has been called off by the Sri lankan authorities as they were "busy with the implementation of many programmes as part of the first hundred days of the presidency of Sirisena".
The DMK came out openly criticising the Sri lankan Government for renewed harassment of fishermen from Tamil Nadu. "The Indian Prime Minister has been claiming that the ties between the two countries have improved considerably and the island nation is a friendly country. How can a friendly nation attack our fishermenIJ" asked TKS Elangovan, spokesman, DMK.
