The Hindu : Two more Coast Guard stations in six months

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Jul 06, 2002

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Two more Coast Guard stations in six months

By Our Staff Reporter

TUTICORIN JULY 5 . Two more Coast Guard stations — one at Jakhau close to Sir Creek on the Indo-Pak. border and another at Vilinjam in Kerala — will be established in six months' time. The two places have been chosen because of their strategic location and from the security point of view, the Director-General of Coast Guard, Vice-Admiral O.P. Bansal, has said.

The Vice-Admiral, who was on his first visit to the Tuticorin Coast Guard station after heightened tension on the Indo-Pak. border in the recent times, said the Coast Guard was in the process of acquiring land and setting up other facilities for establishing the new stations. In the next five years it planned to establish five more and the sites included Pondicherry, Kakinada and Kavaratti. The Government had given its nod for setting up 10 stations.

The Coast Guard was adding assets for better surveillance. An advanced offshore patrol vessel, which was under constructon at the Goa Shipyard, would be inducted by the middle of next year. Two more fast patrol crafts — `Sarojini Naidu' and `Durga Bhai Deshmukh' — would be inducted in September and December respectively. "We have extended our air surveillance capability by inducting seven more Dornier aircraft and six hovercrafts'', the Vice-Admiral said, adding that the force would have another Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH) in August.

During the tension on the border, the force was directed to maintain higher degree of surveillance on the western and eastern coasts, he said. Though the nature of threats on the Indian coast varied, the degree of threat from the west coast was more.

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