Sasanka Perera
(Initially published in The Island, 5 February 2025: https://island.lk/it-reeks-in-the-palk-bay/)
A shooting involving Indian fishermen and Sri Lanka Navy personnel within the island’s territorial waters, and injuries sustained in apprehending the poachers is in the news, yet again. And as is often the case in these countless and never-ending confrontations and competing claims and counter claims in state rituals, we have two versions of the event. But one thing is indisputable: Indian fishermen had entered Sri Lankan waters illegally and thereby came within the jurisdiction of the island nation’s laws and legal apparatuses including interventions by its navy.
Naval action followed by competing statements by India and Sri Lanka are mere state rituals that have not been able to address long-standing practices that pre-existed the formation of nation-states. For the longest time, when national identities, citizenship, and maritime borders did not exist in the legal sense we understand them today, what we now call Sri Lankan and Indian fishermen waded undeterred into each other’s waters and engaged in fishing to their hearts’ content. They even lingered for extended periods of time in each other’s lands during specific fishing periods. I recall engaging in a conversation at the turn of the century with one such fisherman from South India who had decided to settle in Chilaw long ago. In his case and that of many of his comrades at the time, it was a matter of marrying into the Sinhala speaking fisher families. Over time, these people blended into local communities. At the height of these activities and even after both India and Sri Lanka gained independence, the long arm of the nation-states’ laws and national interests did not intervene in such activities beyond a point. But this changed as nation-states evolved into what Ashish Nandi has called ’garrison states’, militarized borders were drawn and bodies of laws developed governing cross-border travel.
Notwithstanding national borders and the associated practices of statecraft and competing nationalisms, fishermen in the two neighbouring countries have continued to wade into each other’s waters consciously disregarding what is known as the International Maritime Boundary Line (IMBL) due to its invisibility. Such border violations are often deliberate and a matter of routine because fishermen often get away with this infringement. However, the kind of intrusion followed by violence now in the news is not the norm, but the exception.
In a statement issued on 28 January 2025, India’s Ministry of External Affairs noted that “an incident of firing by the Sri Lankan Navy during the apprehension of 13 Indian fishermen in the proximity of Delft Island was reported in the early hours of this morning.” It further noted, that “out of the 13 fishermen who were on board the fishing vessel, two have sustained serious injuries and are currently receiving treatment at the Jaffna Teaching Hospital.” But the statement from the Sri Lanka Navy differs in important details. It notes that Sri Lanka’s “Northern Naval Command observed a cluster of Indian fishing boats poaching in the Sri Lankan waters off Valvettithurai, Jaffna in the dark hours of 27 Jan 25.” This location is much closer to the Sri Lankan coast than what the Indian statement claims, yet it is evident from both statements that the incident took place well within Sri Lanka’s territorial waters. This discrepancy in the statements is intriguing as the two locations are approximately 62.4 km apart. Interestingly, the contested island of Kachchatheevu is 22.4 km from Delft, the location given in the Indian statement, and 84.7 km from Valvettithurai. Therefore, a careful reader may not be faulted in wondering if locating the scene closer to Kachchatheevu is deliberate, given that the island is a bone of contention between the two countries.
The Navy statement further states, “subsequently, the Northern Naval Command mounted a special operation to send away those fishing boats from the island waters, deploying naval craft. During this operation, the Navy seized an Indian fishing boat [that] continued to remain in Sri Lankan waters, while marshalling illegal fishing activities and collecting the fishing harvest. The operation also led to the apprehension of 13 Indian fishermen aboard the fishing boat.”
For Sri Lanka, this is not merely an accident that can be wished away as the somewhat clinical Indian statement does. It goes beyond protecting the maritime borders of the country, to preserving a crucial source of livelihood of many people in northern Sri Lanka and other parts of the island. It is both a bread-and-butter issue as it is a matter of national interest. Therefore, the Sri Lanka Navy has acted precisely in the manner that it should, as is expected and is within its mandate. Is it also not ironic that the bleeding hearts of southern Indian politicians who are up in arms about the so-called discrimination and abuse of their Tamil brethren in Sri Lanka by its government, seem to turn bone dry when their constituent fishermen callously plunder the resource-rich fertile waters of Sri Lanka, thereby remorselessly depriving their Tamil brothers and sisters of their livelihood.
The Sri Lankan statement further notes, “the Sri Lanka Navy boarding team was compelled to conduct noncompliance boarding as the Indian fishing boat continued to maneuver aggressively, without complying with the Navy’s lawful orders and its duty, during the process of taking the boat into custody. On this occasion, the Indian fishermen have acted aggressively, maneuvering their fishing boat in a hostile manner and behaving confrontationally with the Navy. However, while boarding the fishing boat in accordance with the authority vested in the Navy, the Indian fishermen, as an organized group, have attempted to assault naval personnel and made an attempt to snatch a firearm from a naval officer, endangering the lives of the naval personnel. In the process, an accidental fire has taken place, causing slight injuries to two Indian fishermen.” So unlike in the Indian statement which refers to ‘serious injuries’ the Sri Lankan statement refers to ‘slight injuries.’
What is seen here is not a deliberate act of shooting as the Indian statement and much of the Indian reporting on the incident insinuates, but an accident that has occurred due to the aggression and unlawful behaviour of Indian fishermen in a location in the sovereign territory of another country, they had no business of being in, in the first place. Intriguingly, none of these details are present in the Indian statement. It merely says that in addition to lodging a ‘strong’ complaint against the incident with the Acting High Commissioner in Delhi and the Sri Lankan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “government of India has always emphasized the need to treat issues pertaining to fishermen in a humane and humanitarian manner, keeping in mind livelihood concerns. The use of force is not acceptable under any circumstances whatsoever. Existing understandings between the two Governments in this regard must be strictly observed.”
India’s Ministry of Externa Affairs lodging a complaint with our Acting Hish Commissioner in Delhi and a similar complaint being made by its High Commission to our Foreign Ministry is the height of absurdity. While our Foreign Ministry and missions may be numb to such action, we should be mindful that the main infraction — Indian poaching — happened in our waters and therefore comes under the jurisdiction of Sri Lankan laws, in the dispensation of which accidents can also happen.
In any case, this statement itself may seem well articulated in the lofty corridors of performative and orchestrated diplomacy and the Indian Ocean conference circuit. But it makes little sense beyond as an example of excessive verbosity in the real world of cross-border poaching and naval action in the darkness of the night involving aggressive culprits and the threatened livelihoods of citizens of a sovereign country. Besides, it was just over six months ago that a young Sri Lankan sailor brutally met his end because of the aggressive maneuvering of an Indian trawler in Sri Lankan waters. Therefore, these statements are naught but mere rhetoric, of no use to the Sri Lankan fishermen who — through no fault of their own — have to bear the brunt of Indian infractions and incursions into their bread-basket.
What is obvious in these rituals of statecraft is the woeful absence of proactive action on the part of Sri Lanka. If India can summon our Acting High Commissioner to their Ministry of External Affairs and lodge a ‘strong’ complaint over an accident stemming from an illegal Indian activity that took place in our waters, did our Foreign Ministry summon the Indian High Commissioner to protest against his compatriots illegally and perpetually entering our waters, behaving aggressively towards our navy and depriving a section of our citizens of their only livelihood? Did our Foreign Ministry ask him why they have opted to report basic facts wrong in their statement? Silence in such situations is not only extremely dangerous but also smacks of pusillanimity. This kind of institutionalized timidity on the part of Sri Lanka does not augur well for the country at the time we are celebrating our supposed ‘Independence,’ and is also counterintuitive to the notion of national interest.
This general lack of intent towards meaningful action is also evident in the Joint Statement of 16 December 2024, issued during President Anura Kumara Disanayaka’s visit to India which states that “acknowledging the issues faced by fishermen on both sides and factoring in the livelihood concerns, the leaders agreed on the need to continue to address these in a humanitarian manner. In this regard, they also underscored the need to take measures to avoid any aggressive behaviour or violence. They welcomed the recent conclusion of the 6th Joint Working Group Meeting on Fisheries in Colombo. The leaders expressed confidence that through dialogue and constructive engagements a long-lasting and mutually acceptable solution could be achieved. Given the special relationship between India and Sri Lanka, they instructed officials to continue their engagement to address these issues.” Here, the omission of any reference to the destructive bottom-trawling fishing method is conspicuous by its stark absence. It is indeed unfathomable that the Sri Lankan team did not insist on the inclusion of this critical reference in the statement.
Rampantly used by Indian fishermen, bottom-trawling disrupts the seabed, marine ecosystem and biodiversity of the Palk Bay, while boosting India’s seafood exports and yielding high profits while destroying the Sri Lankan fishermen’s livelihoods. For this reason, Sri Lanka banned bottom-trawling in 2017. However, none of these are in the Joint Statement of 16 December 2024 or the Sri Lanka Navy statement of 28 January 2025, and have also not been taken up with the Indian High Commissioner in Colombo. This is not only a failure of Sri Lankan foreign policy in action but also a complete compromise of our country’s national interest.
In this context, the real culprits in the failure to resolve the problem definitively are the leaders of the Indian and Sri Lankan states — politicians and bureaucrats alike. Why has technology not been resorted to more thoughtfully in this situation where the required technology actually exists? For the longest time, both sides have been waxing eloquent about attaching non-tamperable and permanently switched-on transponders to fishing boats which will inform the Navies or Coast Guards of the two countries when maritime border violations take place. As a technologically advanced country, India has the higher capacity to produce the required innovative mechanisms and tools for this purpose that can be used in both countries for mutual benefit. Bilateral collaboration of this nature can actually bear fruit rather than the hollow discourses of rhetorical diplomacy and statecraft.
For India, these issues are important only insofar as they resonate with Tamil Nadu politics and therefore possible vote banks. In reality, it is never about the lives or livelihoods of poor South Indian fishermen or their confiscated properties. For Sri Lanka, it is a matter of ill-defined sovereignty and the livelihood of a significant section of the people in the north. At the same time, this unfolds in a situation where the Sri Lankan Navy is unable to patrol the country’s maritime borders effectively, a known fact which Indian fishermen exploit as a matter of routine.
If both countries are adequately serious beyond issuing mere statements after the fact, these incursions are easily stoppable. However, once the technology is put in place as a matter of law, both countries must enforce them to the letter, and patrol the borders more effectively. But, pending the fruition of such law, Indian fishermen, cannot be allowed to plunder Sri Lankan resources. It is also high time, the Sri Lankan government, with the kind of overwhelming mandate it has received from the people, make it very clear to the Indian state that endless incursions into our territorial waters and ravishing of the country’s natural resources can no longer be tolerated. And if legitimate deterrence is to be used in protecting our borders and resources as do all sovereign states including India, so be it. This is the minimum we expect from our government in its pursuit of our national interest.