FREDDY REBELLO
POINGUINIM: Two groups of trawler fishermen were quarreling at the fisheries jetty at Karwar on Saturday –one trawler owner was from Betul-Goa, while the other was from Karwar. No police complaint was lodged because the issue had nothing to do with fishing but with the sale of contraband liquor which was clandestinely sold to Karwar through mechanized boats.
This illicit liquor trade via the sea route goes on not only along the Goa-Karnataka coastline but even upto Kerala, and northwards to Maharashtra from the North Goa coastal belt. The Marine Police team at Talpona, Canacona is equipped with a boat, office, communication facility and manpower but they are helpless in intercepting these trawlers because the law breakers are politically influential and sometimes even have media gagged.
The particular Goans trawler owners were selling IMFL branded liquor to the Karwar traders at a much cheaper rate, as compared to the rates charged by the Karwari liquor smugglers.
Liquor rates in Goa are perhaps the cheapest in the country and are at least four times higher across the border. Hence interstate mechanized trawler operators instead of going for fishing have found smuggling of liquor to the neighbouring states a very lucrative business compared to fishing. That apart, they also get diesel at a subsidized rate.
These illicit liquor traders who have a fixed clientele, leave from a Goan jetty by night loading the IMFL bottles under the cover of darkness and reach the bordering states in the wee hours of the morning. the contraband is then put on a dingy (a small boat attached to the rear of the trawler) that off loads the liquor at a remote and isolated beach along the neighbouring coast.
Rajesh Chopdekar, a leading fish wholesaler from Karwar says that there is hardly any fish catch because their motto is not to catch fish but to sell Goan liquor at a higher premium where they reap more profits as compared to catching fish which is laborious and time consuming. “After off-loading the contraband liquor, the Goan trawlers move towards their mother port at midnight and on the way catch fish and that is sold in the Goan fish market by morning.
The Karwar motorized boats ply the same trade in reverse order. They leave the Karwar port at dusk, do fishing in the Arabian Sea, reach Betul and other ports in South Goa, off-load the fish and load IMFL in the trawlers by dingy and this is clandestinely transported to Karwar and other nearby coastal areas and from there it is transported to Bhatkal, Kundapur, Mangalore and Kerala.
The IMFL from Goa that is transported to Karwar is of much cheaper rate, while the one that is offloaded after Karwar is of premium brands where the margin is much, as also are the stakes.
It is learnt that one trawler operator from Karwar was regularly purchasing liquor bottles from a liquor dealer at Betalbatim and when his credit bills went high, the latter refused to supply him stock on credit. The Karwari boatman then approached another liquor dealer at Betalbatim and restarted his business. The creditor became incensed and alerted the Ankola-Karnataka excise who promptly seized the boat with the contraband liquor in 2013.
Ratnakar Harikantra, a Karwari fisherman, told Herald, that there are over 200 illegal liquor outlets in Karwar at various places and they regularly pay bribes to the men in uniform and do roaring business throughout the year and including on dry days. On dry days they cater only to their regular customers while the non regulars are shunned away or made to carry the liquor clandestinely. No sitting or consuming liquor at the venue is allowed for irregular clients.
Sources told Herald said that the boat owners from Karwar used to buy liquor from Polem and other spots along Canacona coast but when excise inspector Chandranath Desai took charge of Canacona division, all of the illicit liquor traders from Karwar shifted their base to other places and even to Salcete coast.
