India’s External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said Friday that Sri Lankan authorities are arresting Indian fishermen because of an Emergency-era agreement that gave up fishing rights in some areas.
“At the time, several big decisions would be taken without a debate. These days, there is a discussion about our fishermen going to Sri Lanka and getting arrested there. That is because of an agreement signed with Sri Lanka at the time of Emergency under which the rights of the fishermen to fish in some part of Sri Lankan waters were given up by us,” he said at a BJP youth wing event to mark the 50th anniversary of the Emergency.
Tamil Nadu’s DMK government has repeatedly raised the issue with the Union government. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi earlier this year, calling for the return of Katchatheevu island that was handed over to Sri Lanka through agreements signed in 1974 and 1976.
The decades-old dispute resurfaced last year after Modi posted on X that the Congress “callously gave away” Katchatheevu to Sri Lanka in the 1970s.
Government data shows Sri Lanka has arrested more than 528 Indian fishermen in 2024.
Jaishankar said: “If it wasn’t for an Emergency Parliament, if Parliament at the time was a genuine Parliament, there would have been a debate and I don’t know if the Parliament would have allowed such an agreement,” he said. “The decisions taken at the time still show their impact in the state of Tamil Nadu.” The state is expected to go to the polls next year.
The External Affairs Minister also took aim at the Congress party, stating that one family’s interests were placed above the nation during the Emergency.
Source: The Indian Express
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