After five years, BSF intercepts Pakistani boat at Sir Creek

A senior officer from the BSF said, “Though the boat was intercepted at Sir Creek, the Gujarat Frontier, the first layer of security in the creek area, had failed to detect the boat. When the boat was intercepted, it was found empty. It was checked thoroughly and nothing was found on it. We suspect that the fishermen or those who were on board fled.”

The BSF officials said the boat is 30 to 40 feet long and comparatively smaller to the fishing boats that come from the Pakistani waters. Since there were no crew members on board the boat, the BSF has alerted the State police, the Indian Navy and the Indian Coast Guard to increase their vigilance. It was suspected that the crew members of the boat might have entered from the Creek side and abandoned it to mislead the BSF.

According to the BSF sources, the boat was seen coming at around 12:30 am by the BSF commandos. After keeping a close watch for about an hour, the empty boat was found floating in Indian waters at Sir Creek. This has raised the suspicion of the BSF.  Usually, the fishermen who go astray in Indian waters and are caught within minutes of their touching the Indian maritime zone.

The BSF suspected that the crew members of the boat had fled sensing their presence or they had left the boat near the Indian waters giving a signal of possible intrusion in coming days. The intelligence wing of the BSF had been on alert for more than a one month for possible Pakistani intrusion from the border areas in Kutch through land or marshy waters of the creeks between Kutch and Pakistan.

The Indian Coast Guard had apprehended a Pakistani boat ‘Al-Rahimo’  with six fishermen off Jamnagar coast in October. It had left Karachi on October 1 and was found near the Indian maritime border. with 150 kilograms of fish. Though the fishermen had caught a huge quantity of fish within first three days of their fishing, they were found near the Jamnagar coast leading to the suspicion of the ICG.
During interrogation by the ICG, the fishermen had failed to explain why they came deeper into the Indian waters even after having a huge stock of fish.

The fishermen were interrogated by several agencies where they claimed that they wanted to collect huge stock of fishing so that they had enough stock for two months. However, the ICG suspected that the Pakistani crew members had used the stock of fish as a cover to enter the Indian waters to be able to enter inside.