Union Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman has said that a submarine of the Indian Navy has been pressed into service to trace the missing fishermen in the post-Cyclone Ockhi phase.

Cyclone Ockhi hit Kanniyakumari District and other coastal Districts in all its fury in the last week of November and didn’t spare the nearby Trivandrum District as well. Thousands of trees and electric poles were uprooted as the cyclone left a trail of destruction behind causing floods and bringing normal life to a halt for more than a couple of days. Thousands of fishermen fishing in deep-seas went missing.

Rescue efforts to trace them have been going on at a hectic pace. ‘Vaibhav’, a submarine of the Indian Navy, has also been pressed into service with the Navy offering its might in the search operations. The submarine left the Tuticorin Port yesterday with local fishermen, who knew the navigation routes very well, on board to assist the submarine’s crew.

Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the decision to dispatch a submarine, in addition to the Navy and Coast Guard’s ships which are already looking for survivors among fishermen, was made following a request by her Ministerial colleague and senior BJP leader Pon Radhakrishnan.