Around 130 tourists, most of them from Gujarat, found themselves stranded on the Kalpeni island of Lakshadweep on Saturday with no water, food or communication with the outside world.
It was a situation that occurs only in movies but, in this case, it was happening for real. Around 130 tourists, most of them from Gujarat, found themselves stranded on the Kalpeni island of Lakshadweep on Saturday with no water, food or communication with the outside world.
The tourists, including 26 children, had arrived here earlier in the day from Kavaratti, the headquarters island of Lakshadweep. They were about to board a mini-boat that would take them to the cruise ship, MV Kavaratti, when about 300 local villagers stopped
them saying they did not have valid tickets. The tourists had to stay on the island without food or water till around 2:30 am on Sunday when help finally arrived.
Chief minister Narendra Modi, whose office was informed of the incident, called up Union home minister P Chidambaram and asked him to intervene in the matter. Officials of the Gujarat Information Office in New Delhi said in a statement that the issue was then taken up directly with the administrator of Lakshadweep to resolve the crisis.
The tourists’ ordeal ended when the police dispersed the villagers at around 2:30 am on Sunday and escorted them to the ship that would take them to Minicoy Island, the third (and last) island on the tourists’ itinerary. The port officer said all the passengers had valid tickets and they were allowed to board the vessel.
Anil Shah, a resident of Gandhinagar, and his family were among the tourists stranded on Kalpeni island. Shah said they had opted for Lakshadweep for their holidays this Diwali and had chosen a special package of Lakshadweep tourism named, 'Coral Reef', which included a visit to three islands -Kavaratti, Minicoy, and Kalpeni.
The tourists had left from Kochi on October 27. Kalpeni was the second island on their itinerary. On Saturday, the tourists were taken to Kalpeni in mini-boats while the main ship waited in deep sea. The island does not have the infrastructure to provide accommodation to such a large group of tourists. Hence, it was decided to return to the cruise ship by evening after spending the day on the island, Shah said. "However, when we reached the jetty to board the mini-boats that would take us to the cruise ship, some local people stopped us and closed the jetty gates," said Shah. It was the phone of Minal Dave, a professor from Bharuch, which saved the day for the tourists as the phones of all others in the group were not working.
Dave said they waited for an hour or two but the situation soon began to deteriorate. "The climate, too, was against us. It began to rain. There were children and elderly people among the tourists and no one was carrying medicines or any first-aid material. It became a nightmare," said Dave. Finally, using Dave's phone, the Gujaratis among tourists were able to contact Gujarat government officials who informed the chief minister's office about their plight.
The tourists said that they were stopped by the local people because of differences with the officials of Lakshadweep tourism over remuneration. The villagers thought stopping the tourists was the best way to negotiate with the authorities.
The group was finally taken to the cruise ship in the early hours of Sunday. From there, the tourists proceeded to Minicoy. After visiting the last island on their itinerary, the group left for Kochi on Sunday evening and is expected to reach there by Monday afternoon.
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