Private boats lacks fitness and licence

Vijayawada : Though license and fitness certificates besides lifesaving equipment such as life jackets, life guards and others must for boat operators, majority of the boat operators are violating the norms whereas the officials turned a blind eye on the operators.

In the latest boat mishap incident, the Royal Vasista boat carrying over 64 tourists left for scenic Papi Hills and capsized near Katchuluru Village. Now, the leaders of TDP and CPM and also some organizations wondered how the officials gave permission to the boat as River Godavari had been in spate.

A senior officer with AP Ports said that the recent boat tragedy incident had exposed once against that many boat operators have been operating the boats without following the norms.

The AP Ports was entrusted the task of issuing the license to the boats by the state government effective from November 2017. Before that, the state irrigation department used to take care of the issuance of the license. Sources said that hundreds of boats operating in the state, particularly in Godavari and Krishna districts do not have the license from the Ports Department. Only 150 out of around 750 boats in the state have a valid license from the AP Ports.

The AP government has failed to take action against boat operators as the officials have been collecting the monthly mammals from the operators. If they act against them, why boat tragedies have been reporting says leaders of CPM and CPI.

The boat operators are also not following fire safety measures. As per the norms they have to follow the fire safety norms such as extinguishers, sand buckets, caution boards, lifeguards and few others for fire control. But the fire service personnel are not conducting any raids on the boat to verify the fire safety measures, and the left parties leaders pointed out.