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This little island between India and its neighbour has PM Modi fuming… What’s Katchatheevu all about?

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00:00This tiny Sri Lankan island has gotten Indian politicians all riled up
00:04Sri Lanka aur Tamil Nadu ke beech me samandar me ek tapu hai, ek deep hai, kaccha thivu
00:15But its story is such that everyone from Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru to Prime Minister
00:20Indira Gandhi and now PM Narendra Modi were compelled to pay attention to it
00:24The island of Kaccha Thivu is small, just over 1.5 km in length and about 300 m in width
00:31Its actually also a relatively new island, formed somewhere in the 14th century because
00:36of a volcanic eruption
00:37Kaccha Thivu lies as an uninhabited speck on the park strait between India and Sri Lanka
00:43Its just 30 km away from Rameshwaram and 60 km from Jaffna
00:48There are no buildings on this island, just a 20th century catholic church, St. Anthony's
00:53where devotees from both India and Sri Lanka attend an annual service
00:57Other than this, people can't really live on the island because there is no source of
01:01drinking water
01:02Back in the early medieval period, Kaccha Thivu was a part of Sri Lanka's Jaffna Kingdom
01:07But in the 17th century, the control of the island went to the Ramnath Kingdom, based
01:12out of Ramanathapuram, just north of Rameshwaram
01:16Kaccha Thivu became a part of the Madras Presidency under the British
01:19In 1921, when both India and Sri Lanka were British colonies, they both laid claim to
01:25the island
01:26This was to determine fishing boundaries at the time
01:29Kaccha Thivu continued to be under dispute even after independence
01:32The Indian view also was that there was absence of any documentary evidence to show that Sri
01:39Lanka had an original title to Kaccha Thivu
01:42Jaya Shankar said that after independence, both the country's militaries faced issues
01:48over the use of the island
01:50The waters around Kaccha Thivu were integral to the fishing community in Tamil Nadu, whose
01:54livelihoods depended on it
01:56Jaya Shankar added that traditionally too, fishermen had been frequenting the area
02:00In the 1960s, Kaccha Thivu became a regular part of parliamentary discussions
02:18But on the assessment of the whole evidence, it appears to me that the balance lies in
02:25favour of concluding that the sovereignty of the island was and is in India
02:32RTI documents which were obtained by Tamil Nadu BJP Chief K Annamalai in 2024 said
02:39This is an observation by the then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in May of 1961
02:46He writes, I attach no importance at all to this little island and I would have no
02:55hesitation in giving up our claim to it
02:58Jaya Shankar said that Prime Minister Indira Gandhi echoed these sentiments and called
03:03the island a little rock
03:04In 1974, Indira Gandhi signed the India-Sri Lankan Maritime Agreement which, as the BJP
03:11says, ceded Kaccha Thivu to Sri Lanka in an effort to deepen neighbourhood ties
03:15While Indian fishermen were still allowed to access the island, fishing rights remained
03:19unclear
03:20This access was limited to Indians resting, drying their nets and visiting St. Anthony's
03:25Shrine without a visa, according to Sri Lanka
03:28But between 1983 and 2009, as Sri Lanka was in the throes of civil war, the fishing crisis
03:34was on the back burner
03:36Reports suggest that Indian fishermen would venture deep into Sri Lankan waters in big
03:41trawlers
03:42But that ended with the end of the war
03:44Sri Lankan Navy started arresting the Indian fishermen and there were allegations of torture
03:48and custodial deaths
03:50In the last 20 years, 6,184 Indian fishermen have been detained by Sri Lanka
04:016,184
04:04And in the same period, 1,175 Indian fishing vessels have been seized, detained, apprehended
04:16by the Sri Lankans
04:17Each time an incident like this happened, the demand for Kaccha Thivu was reignited
04:23In 2014, then Attorney General Mukul Rohatgi told the Supreme Court, if you want Kaccha
04:28Thivu back, you will have to go to war to get it back
04:32In 2021, more than half of India's fishing catch came from trawlers or trawl nets
04:37These had been banned by countries, including Sri Lanka, over environmental concerns, said
04:42the Central Marine Research Fisheries Institute
04:45In 2024, after Annamalai's RTI, the BJP took up the Kaccha Thivu issue and blamed the Congress
04:51and the DMK for being in cahoots and giving up the island back in 1974
05:21the Kaccha Thivu issue
05:22In 2021, the BJP took up the Kaccha Thivu issue and blamed the Congress and the DMK for
05:28being in cahoots and giving up the island back in 1974
05:31In 2021, after Annamalai's RTI, the BJP took up the Kaccha Thivu issue and blamed the Congress
05:36and the DMK for being in cahoots and giving up the island back in 1974
05:39In 2021, after Annamalai's RTI, the BJP took up the Kaccha Thivu issue and blamed the
05:42Congress and the DMK for being in cahoots and giving up the island back in 1974
05:46Today, in India, the people of Congress, the Indian allies, have cut off a part of Mahabharat
06:01Congress chief Malik Arjun Kharke responded to Modi and reminded him
06:06Under your government, in a friendly gesture, 111 enclaves from India were transferred to Bangladesh
06:12and 55 enclaves came to India