TEAM HERALD
bureau@herald-goa.com
VASCO: Council of Scientific & Industrial Research (CSIR) Director General Prof Samir K Brahmachari on Saturday advised the National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) to provide GPS sets to fishermen connecting to the research ship ‘R V Sindhu Sadhana’, so that signals regarding weather, temperature, wind, salinity and fishing area could be sent back to the system installed in the ship.
Prof Brahmachari was addressing a gathering during the official handing over of the vessel ‘R V Sindhu Sadhana’ by the chairman of ABG Western India Shipyard Rishi Agarwal to Prof. Brahmachari, who is also secretary to the Govemment of India (DSIR).
Prof Brahmachari also urged the NIO to make maximum use of the new research ship to study ocean science and to collect scientific data from the oceans all over the country.
“The ship can also help locate the exact harvesting area and direct the fishermen and the government where to fish and where to put a ban on harvesting of fish,” he said.
Prof. Brahmachari informed that the ship consumes 400 litres of diesel per hour and added that the high cost of fuel should compel scientists to put in maximum efforts to study the ocean and to carry out various scientific activities in the sea.
In his address, Dr Shailesh R Nayak, secretary to the Government of India (Ministry of Earth Sciences), admitted that as far as research ships are concerned, there is a big gap between what is required and what is already there with the NIO.
“Around 15 years back, the Indian Ocean was regarded as a dead ocean but now, times have changed and the Indian Ocean has become a hub of activities for ocean science,” he said.
“India has 2 million square kilometres of special economic zone is not fully utilised to its potential. With an addition of another 1.2 million square kilometres of special economic zone, the total area will be on par with land measuring 3.2 million square kilometres.”
“There is tremendous need of research ships for NIO and the handing over of the R V Sindhu Sadhana to the NIO fulfils a part of that need,” said Dr Nayak.
NIO Director Dr Swa Nakvi informed that the institute got its own research ship R V Sindhu Sadhana after 48 years.
“The first two ships which NIO had are second hand and were converted into research ships, while the RV Sindhu Sadhana is specially built for research purposes,” said Dr Nakvi.
“The new ship will go a long way to meet the needs of NIO and the scientists, as the NIO without a research ship is like a soldier without a gun. Chairman of ABG Western India Shipyard Rishi Agawal also spoke on the occasion.
