January 29, 2004

Fishermen who inadvertently cross over into Pakistan or India end up languishing in jails while their families endure unspeakable hardships, writes Jan Khaskheli

Sakina Mallah, 40, is anxious about her husband Hussain Walri, a traditional fisherman who has been in an Indian jail for the last 10 years. She is surrounded by her children and an aged mother who live with her in her ramshackled home; and she hopes husband and two brothers will be released, sooner or later. “My son Asghar was four-months-old when Hussain went missing, and now he is 10,” she says. Akbar, their other son is ill.

Hussain and four other crew members Siddiq, Achar (Sakina’s brothers) Hanif Murgher and Meenh Wasayo were aboard a boat called Al-Anwer when a sudden tropical storm forced the boat to cross the unmarked sea border into the open sea near India. They were caught by the Indian border’s security force in 1990.

Sakina belongs to Shah Bunder, in Thatta, but now she lives in Ibrahim Hydri in Karachi along with her family and one other brother. The family received a letter from Ahmedabad jail, India, five years after the men went missing and ever since they have been waiting for their release.

Sakina works in a warehouse outside the village, along with other women, collecting fish pieces. She earns Rs70 daily, but says it is not a regular income, hence, she has to face extreme hardships just to be able to feed her children. “It is an awful job, the stench of dead fish is all over the place, and sometimes I become exhausted and am unable to continue working.

“But then I think of my family; my mother is a kidney patient and I know that there is no way out of this horrible work, if my family is to survive,” she says. “My eldest daughter Rozan is a teenager now and it is my desire that her father should come to arrange her marriage. I have been counting days and nights to see him again.”

There are several familes in both the neighbouring countries, who are looking for their loved ones who were lost while in search of livelihood in the open sea, and have not returned home. Both sides’ sea authorities always victimize the poor fishermen to keep their political vendetta intact.

Fishermen in the traditional and small-mechanized boats are caught and jailed by the marine agencies of both the countries on allegations of crossing the sea borders of their respective countries. These fishermen are frequently apprehended mid-sea, charged with violations of maritime boundary, detained and sent to jail. Arrests of the fishermen are mostly arbitrary and in some cases, simply a retaliatory action.

Pakistan and India share the waters and the resources of the Arabian Sea. Pakistan has its coastline of 1,050 kms, while India has a longer coastline of 7,417 kms. There is no proper demarcation of the waters for the fishermen so whenever the maritime security agencies of both the sides want, they hunt boats and put all fish workers into their respective jails. The agency’s personnel treat these fishermen like prisoners of war, because they are not released even after completion of their sentence. It is a gross violation of human rights.

Sa Malay, Sakina’s mother said, “we went to all the influentials including Shafqat Sherazi, now nazim District Thatta, Wali Mohammed Jamote, Haji Shafee Jamote and many others, but all of them refused to support us. We went to them with hope, but they could not provide us solace.”

Assi Mallah, another mother, weeps and says her family’s men went missing in a tropical storm during Nawaz Sharif’s era (1990) and have been in an Indian jail since. The children wear a look of deprivation and do not attend school. “We don’t have enough money to have three meals a day, how can we possibly afford to send our children to school?” she asked. “My husband died after languishing in an Indian jail for five years. I want to see the release of my sons and son-in-law whose children have been anxious and yearning for them.”

Hanif Mallah, another victim, has been missing since June 16, 2003. Hanif was on his way to catch fish along with four others, including his elder brother. It was cloudy weather when the boy left the boat on the seashore near Harami Dhoro, near the Indian border.

Moments later heavy rain began and he could not find his boat. The rain and storm forced the boy to find a safer place but he went missing after that, said his father. “We received a letter from Bhuj jail in India, after two months of his missing. In the letter Hanif wrote what happened and how he was caught and tortured by the Indian border security force,”

The government authorities in Pakistan especially the Maritime Security Agency, as well as the Fishermen’s Cooperative Society, are not accessible to the poor fisher families whose loved ones are in jails.

Thomas Kocherry, founding leader of the World Forum of Fisher People, while addressing the issue of arresting fishermen of Pakistan and India from the sea territory, by border forces of both the rival countries, said “It is an issue of livelihood for these fishermen, from both sides, and it must be resolved amicably without any further delay.”

Kocherry was attending the convention of Pak-India Peoples’ Forum for Peace and Democracy held in Karachi in December 2003. “It is a common problem in the world, for instance, between, Sri Lanka and India, Bangladesh and India, Uganda and Kenya, and Spain and France. Fishermen from these countries are sent to jail because of crossing the sea borders,” Kocherry said.

“Fishermen living in the border areas of these countries should be given identity cards. Commercial fisher people should not come there at all, they should go beyond this area, because, the poor fishermen cannot travel that far. So naturally these border areas and their resources should belong to the traditional fisher people who are dependent on this for their livelihood,” he added.

Kocherry believes that, “these water resources are moving and displacing the people. So naturally India and Pakistan should declare the border area between both the countries as common property, and the fishermen should have access to these water resources.”

According to a list provided by the Fishermen’s Cooperative Society, 113 Pakistani fishermen were arrested from September to December 2003 and are still in Indian custody. Out of them, 107 were arrested in 2003, five others were caught in 1990, and one fisherman Hanif from Jati, has been in Ahmedabad’s Bhuj jail for the last six months. The list shows that 966 Pakistani fishermen and 75 boats have been released and repatriated from India since May 1994. Similarly, Pakistan’s authorities have released 881 Indian fishermen and 149 boats in exchange of Pakistani fishermen.

There are no signs on the sea, which demarcate the sea border. Above all, there is no agreed boundary on the Arabian Sea between India and Pakistan. For their mutual convenience, the patrolling agencies have worked out an imaginary line known as Sir Creek.

Sir Creek is a 38 km-long estuary in the marshes of the Rann of Kutch and is a disputed area near the Indo-Pak sea border. Legend has it that the dispute over Sir Creek began in 1908, much before Partition between the rulers of Sindh and the Rao of Kutch. The dispute was referred to the British government in Bombay which gave its ruling in 1914, along with a map.

However, the dispute remained unsettled, although it lay dormant till the 1960s. Some reports said that Pakistan began laying claims to that half of the Rann of Kutch. This claim was followed by the 1965 India-Pakistan war, which began in the Rann of Kutch.

Reports said that about six rounds of talks have been held between India and Pakistan to sort out the Sir Creek dispute, but the differences between the two sides have yet to be resolved. Some reports hint towards major reservoirs of natural gas and petroleum at Sir Creek, which is why both countries are contesting its occupation.

However, it is the fishermen and their families, of both countries, who are paying the price of the unending rivalry between these two countries.

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