Chief Minister Edappadi K. Palaniswami informed the Legislative Assembly on Friday that the State government was helping the fishermen in Kanniyakumari, who were searching for members of their community who had gone missing during ‘Ockhi’ cyclone, with diesel and food.
The Chief Minister was responding to Leader of the Opposition M.K. Stalin, who cited the statement of Union Defence Minister that the search operations to trace the missing fishermen have been called off. Against this backdrop, he questioned the statement in the Governor’s address that the government was committed to tracing the last fishermen.
“As I had explained earlier, we have been urging the Centre to continue the search operations and we have taken all efforts towards this. We have been extending help to over 300 fishermen who have come forward to search for the missing fishermen. We have been providing them with fuel and food,” Mr. Palaniswami said and maintained that the search operations were continuing.
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More than a month since cyclone ‘Ockhi’ hit Kanniyakumari and neighbouring districts killing hundreds of fishermen, over a 100 fishermen are still missing. Though the Navy and the Coast Guard were involved in the search operations to locate the missing fishermen, the operations were said to have been called off.