21 May 2020  |   05:55am IST

State unlikely to reduce quarantine time for seafarers

The State government is in no mood to reduce the number of quarantine days for the homecoming seafarers. Advocate General Devidas Pangam said the government disagrees with the demand of the seafarers and their families to reduce the quarantine period.

“We have disagreed with the demand to lessen the number of quarantine days. The government decides the quarantine period which is in their own interest, in the interest of the family members of the very same seafarers and the people at large,” Pangam told the media on Thursday. 

A group of seafarers on Tuesday had approached the High Court of Bombay at Goa challenging the paid quarantine facility for the homecoming seafarers and additional quarantine period despite testing negative for COVID-19.  The petitioners, in the plea filed on Tuesday, objected on the two aspects and sought the court’s intervention for relief. The next hearing in the petition is likely in June.