JOIN USA fisherman, whose two fellow boatmen were killed by the Italian marines off Kerala coast in 2012, has approached the Supreme Court seeking invocation of stringent anti-piracy law, entailing death penalty, against the accused.
Kanyakumari resident Kilsariyan described the Centre’s decision not to charge Italian naval officers Latorre Massimiliano and Salvatore Girone with the offences under the Suppression of Unlawful Acts against Safety of Maritime Navigation and Fixed Platforms on Continental Shelf Act (SUA), 2002 as “illegal, ultra vires and violative of Articles 14 and 21 of the Constitution”.
The move would “tacitly facilitate the accused to escape from their criminal liability,” the petitioner alleged.
The petition filed by advocate Harshad V Hameed also sought direction to the government to prosecute the officers under the provisions of the Admiralty Offences (Colonial) Act, 1849 which provided for extra territorial jurisdiction and empowered authorities to take legal action for the crimes committed upon the sea.
The NIA has been entrusted with the task of filing the charge sheet in the killings of fishermen Ajeesh Pink and Valaentene Jelastine on board of vessel St Antony that took place off Kerala coast on February 15, 2012.
The Kerala Police initially investigated the matter and filed the charge sheet under the SUA Act and other laws. But the apex court in 2013 took the case from the state police’s and directed the Centre to set up a special court for the trial.
Subsequently, the Centre took a stand before the SC that the accused officers would not be charged with the anti-piracy law, in a move to avert a probable diplomatic row with Italy.
In the writ petition before the court, the victim’s fellow fisherman contended that the decision by Union government was “palpably wrong, highly arbitrary, and violative of his fundamental rights”.