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Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) president M.K. Stalin on Tuesday slammed the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for raising the Katchatheevu issue ahead of the parliamentary elections later this month.
He questioned why Prime Minister Narenda Modi has never spoken to the Sri Lankan government about the return of the island, which was “gifted away” by India in 1974, reported NDTV.
Katchatheevu, an uninhibited strip of land spanning about 1.9 sq km, is located in the Palk Strait, a stretch of ocean which divides India and Sri Lanka. It lies close to Rameswaram town in Tamil Nadu and south-west of Sri Lanka’s Jaffna city.
It has no source of drinking water and the only structure on it is a church. But the small island has become a hot topic after fishermen from Tamil Nadu, who use it as a resting spot, have been shot at and arrested by the Sri Lankan navy, and Mr Modi accused the country’s opposition Congress party – which was in power at the time – of “callously” giving it away to Sri Lanka.
The DMK ruled the state at the time.
“How many times has PM Narendra Modi gone to Sri Lanka in the last 10 years? Has he asked the Sri Lanka government to give back Katchatheevu even once?” said Mr Stalin.
The DMK leader said the BJP is trying to turn Katchatheevu into a controversy to gain votes in the southern state, where it has been trying hard to make inroads.
Tamil Nadu will vote in the first phase of the elections on April 19.
The Tamil Nadu chief minister further pointed out that in 2015, Foreign Minister S. Jaishankar, who was then foreign secretary, had said that Katchatheevu was never a part of India – and now that elections are looming, his stance has changed.
“For many years, whenever questions were raised in Parliament on Katchatheevu, no proper answer was given,” said Mr Stalin. “The BJP government said the case was in the Supreme Court. But now suddenly PM Modi is shedding crocodile tears for Katchatheevu.
“In the last 10 years, PM Modi never spoke about Tamil fishermen’s arrests by the Sri Lankan navy. Has PM Modi condemned Sri Lanka ever?”
The controversy began on Sunday when Mr Modi shared an article from The Times of India on X, saying “Eye-opening and startling! New facts reveal how Congress callously gave away Katchatheevu.”
The article was based on documents obtained by the BJP’s Tamil Nadu chief K. Annamalai. The documents quoted Mr Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s prime minister at the time, saying that he attached “no importance at all to (Katchatheevu)“, and that he “would have no hesitation in giving up (India’s) claims to it”.
But, according to the report, some officials from the Ministry of External Affairs and other experts said that India has a “good legal case” to assert claim over Katchatheevu, as they claimed the island was ruled by an Indian king continuously between 1875 and 1948.
In 1974, when Nehru’s daughter Indira Gandhi was prime minister, the Indian government ended the dispute with Sri Lanka by relinquishing any claim over the island.
Two years later, India and Sri Lanka signed an agreement that prevented people from both countries from fishing in waters belonging to the other.
Since then, political parties in Tamil Nadu have regularly raised the issue of Katchatheevu and filed cases in court challenging the agreement with Sri Lanka – two of these cases are pending in the Supreme Court.
After Mr Modi’s post, many BJP leaders and federal ministers joined him in criticising the Congress party. They also said the DMK did not do enough to retain Katchatheevu.
The DMK has denied this, saying its leaders were not aware of the decision to relinquish claim over the island until the agreement was completed.
“The DMK had written several letters to the foreign ministry over the past decades, upholding the rights of Tamil Nadu’s fishermen over Katchatheevu. The BJP woke up to the issue only now, just as elections are nearing,” DMK spokesperson Saravanan Annadurai told the BBC.
Sri Lanka’s foreign minister said on April 3 that it does not see any need to re-open talks on the island.
“This is a problem discussed and resolved 50 years ago and there is no necessity to have further discussions on this,” Mr Ali Sabry told the domestic Hiru television channel.
“For many years, whenever questions were raised in Parliament on Katchatheevu, no proper answer was given. The BJP government said the case was in the Supreme Court. But now suddenly PM Modi is shedding crocodile tears for Katchatheevu.”
