It was on February 8 that The Goan had first reported the strong opposition brewing amongst traditional fishermen and small boat owners to fishing with LED lights by some of the vessels operating from the Cutbona fishing jetty.
The issue triggered an uproar at Cutbona on that day when boat owners nearly came to blows over the contentious issue, but Fisheries Director Shamila Monteiro had feigned ignorance about it.
Around that time, it is learnt only a couple of purse seine vessels had installed LED lights and generators on their fishing vessels. As days passed by and no firm decision came from the Fisheries Department, the activity got a boost with more and more vessels venturing out in the sea with LED lights.
During the last three months, the traditional fishermen knocked the doors of Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar, Fisheries Minister Avertano Furtado and Fisheries Director to highlight their plight.
On March 23, the Fisheries Director dashed off letters to the cooperative societies based at Cutbona, Chapora, Vasco and Malim with a plea to direct boat owners to remove all LED installations within one week. The Fisheries Director had then warned of action against the owners of vessels using LED lights. The warning, however, did not translate into action.
The Fisheries Director had told the media on March 23 that the department will approach the deputy collectors to initiate action against erring fishing vessels. But the proposed action never materialized, prompting the traditional fishermen to come under one banner to force the government to issue a notification to ban fishing with LED lights.
