The Killer Waves
Sri Lanka
Indian Navy swings into action in Lanka
PK Balachanddran
Colombo, December 29, 2004
The Indian Navy is involved in a whole range of rescue, relief and clearance operations in Galle and Trincomalee in tsunami-ravaged Sri Lanka.
An Indian High Commission official said that naval engineers were clearing and repairing the battered Galle Harbour so that the two Indian Off Shore Patrol Vessels (OPV), carrying 40 tonnes of relief materials including medicines, could enter the harbour.
But whatever could be sent to the shore by boats and choppers were being dispatched to places indicated by the Sri Lankan Navy, the official told Hindustan Times.
Indian helicopters, including the two naval Chetaks on board the OPVs, were already fully participating in the search and rescue operations in the Galle-Matara area.
Thirty sorties had been flown till the evening of Tuesday and 25 tonnes of supplies had landed, the official said.
Naval diving teams and choppers have rescued 190 people, mostly foreign tourists, in the Galle and Matara area, where more than 6,000 people were killed in last Sunday's sea fury.
The bodies of ten foreigners were flown to Colombo.
The Indian armed forces also participated in the mass burial of 300 bodies in Embilipitiya, a task, which was hampered greatly by incessant rains.
Six Indian Air Force helicopters were flying sorties from Katunayake (Colombo), Ratmalana and Koggala near Galle, ferrying food, clothing, and medicines. They also ferried survivors and the dead.
The two Indian ships anchored in Trincomalee in eastern Sri Lanka, had handed over 30 tonnes of relief material to the Government Agent of the district.
Two of the three Indian medical teams were working in Mutur (one of the worst affected areas) and one in the battered tourist resort of Nilaveli.
Asked if the Indian teams would go to the LTTE controlled areas in Mullaitivu district further north, the official said that it was up to the Sri Lankan authorities to decide where the Indian teams should be deployed.
It is believed that two Russian medical teams were in Mullaitivu.
According to the Indian official, the Indians would be deployed in the northern Jaffna peninsula, where the unofficial death toll is more than 2,000.
Much of the Jaffna peninsula is under government control, which makes the task of deployment of Indians and foreigners easier.
© HT Media Ltd. 2004.