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Police question Lankan youth who swam to reach Dhanushkodi

- October 10, 2022

Chennai, Oct 10 (BPNS)

Central intelligence agencies and the elite ‘Q’ branch of the Tamil Nadu police are interrogating a 24-year-old Sri Lankan youth who had swam to reach Dhanushkodi on Sunday.

The youth identified as Hassan Khan of Mannar district in Sri Lanka, according to Tamil Nadu coastal police, jumped to the sea at Palk Strait after the Sri Lankan navy fired at a boat that was illegally carrying him and five others to Indian shores. When the Navy fired, he dodged the bullets and swam to Dhanushkodi.

The other passengers in the boat on reaching the shores of Ramanathapuram told the coastal police about Khan who had jumped into the sea. Coastal police on search found him in the sea and rescued him.

However Central agencies are not clear on the actual motive of Khan and his questioning is continuing. According to officers of the Tamil Nadu police, he had informed the officers that his parents lived in Puducherry and he had escaped to India to overcome the acute financial issues in the island nation. The police and central agencies are verifying his statement and if found satisfactory, he would be lodged at the Mandapam rescue camp where 175 people who reached Indian after the crisis erupted in Sri Lanka are staying.

Police sources told BPNS that with the LTTE trying for regrouping, the agencies are skeptical of anyone who reaches Indian shores from Lanka and that if satisfactory answers are not provided, anyone who reaches Indian shores through illegal ferrying will be subjected to detailed interrogation.