Survey by ONGC
The Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum & Natural Gas Shri Dharmendra Pradhan informed the Lok Sabha in a written reply today that Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Limited (ONGC) has conducted seismic survey in offshore areas adjoining Maharashtra and Gujarat during the last field season from November, 2014 to May, 2015. During the survey ONGC has acquired 11388 Sq. Km. of 3D seismic data in the Western Periphery of Mumbai High. ONGC allows fishing activities in the adjoining areas barring the small area of survey for 15-20 days so that neither fishing activities nor ONGC's seismic survey work gets substantially affected. The fishermen reoccupy the concerned area once the survey work is completed.
The delegations from fishing communities/ associations/ societies have demanded compensation for stopping fishing activities in Mumbai offshore areas.
ONGC has taken the following steps to mitigate the hardships of the fishing communities on the above count:
(i) To minimize the impact of seismic surveys the survey block is divided into small sub-sectors of 15-20 days of survey work and advance intimation of schedule of survey work in each sub-sector is given to fishermen 15 days in advance through distribution of leaflets and letters.
(ii) Fishermen are also advised to fish in the adjoining areas for such a short time and then come back to the original area once the survey job is completed in that small portion.
(iii) ONGC through its contractor has been compensating fisherman for their loss of fishing equipment, nets and other tools, if any, which are either lost or damaged during survey work.
MJPS/Rk
