The Pakistan High Commission in Delhi today granted visa to a delegation of eight persons from Gujarat to visit the neighbouring country for completion of formalities to bring back 57 seized boats anchored at a port in Karachi.
The eight-member delegation comprises of leaders of fishermen community and an official of the Gujarat fisheries department.
Earlier, Member of Parliament Parimal Nathwani had written to Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif urging him to expedite visa processing to the delegation.
Assistant Director, Gujarat Fisheries department, Dr P C Malli said that Pakistan High Commission office has informed the fisheries department that it has issued visa to the members of the delegation for one month and it is only for Karachi city.
He said the delegation will leave for Pakistan on March 8.
In the letter to Sharif, the MP had said it was imperative to bring these seized fishing boats back on humanitarian grounds as it served as a means of livelihood to hundreds of fishermen and their families.
"These 8-member team consisting leaders of fishermen community and an official of the Gujarat fisheries department have been camping in Delhi for last one week and awaiting visa," he had said.
Documents related to the seized boats have already been sent to the authorities concerned in Pakistan, Malli said.
"The delegation will try to complete all the formalities for bringing the boats back. The visit was needed for verifying and checking the sea worthiness of the seized boats as 53 of them require minor repairs and remaining major repairs, before they could be physically taken over by us," he said.
"Either Pakistan can release the 114 fishermen who are lodged in jails there to ferry the boats back or grant visa to an equal number of fishermen from Gujarat who can go to Karachi for repair works and bring them to India," he said.
The decision to release the boats came after an announcement by Sharif on the eve of his visit to Delhi in May 2014 for attending the swearing-in ceremony of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
