I was desperate to survive, says Indian sailor stranded in sea for a year

Nirmal Singh Rawat

Nirmal Singh Rawat, a 26-year-old Indian sailor, finally set foot on land on Tuesday, after being stranded all alone at sea for over a year.
For more than a year, he went through extreme living conditions, lack of proper food and drinking water and crippling depression, all alone on board the vessel Hamed 2.
After his endeavour, a visibly nervous, yet relieved Rawat arrived at Khalid Port, Sharjah, with the intervention of the Federal Transport Authority (FTA) and help from Indian Consulate in Dubai and social worker Girish Pant.
For an entire year, the ship was anchored eight nautical miles (15km) away from Khalid Port, in the deep sea in a blackout situation and Rawat would sleep on the ship's deck because the humidity inside the vessel was unbearable.
A few hours after he debarked from the ship, and while waiting for immigration clearance, Rawat told Khaleej Times: "I was desperate to survive. and to go back home to my parents, who have no clue that this has happened to me. It is the one thing that kept me going."
Vipul, Consul-General of India in Dubai, said Rawat went through a horrible ordeal and has assured that he would hopefully be repatriated back to India in a day or two.
The story so far
The young sailor from Dehradun, Uttarakhand, India, arrived at the Sharjah International Airport in July, 2016. He embarked on board the diesel tanker, Hamed 2 - which bears North Korean flag - from Ajman in the hope that he would be able to make a sizeable sum of money for his family's needs.
Unfortunately, for Rawat and the rest of his crew, the owners of the ship refused to pay the sailors. When the crew learnt that the owner of the ship has been arrested, all other crew members, including the captain, signed off on December 2016, without pay.
When he bid good-bye to the rest of the crew, he stayed on, hoping to get paid. Little did he realise that he would be stranded for an entire year. "I got food, water and some diesel supplies every few days from ships that sailed past me, from the FTA, and from my other sailor friends," he added. Since Rawat did not have any means to communicate, he would wait for supplies from ships passing by, so that he could charge his phones to call for help. In one case, he rewired some batteries and plugged it into the charger so that he could make a one minute call.
According to Rawat, another ship crashed into Hamed-2 five months ago, further endangering his life. "I could not communicate with other ships since there was no electricity on-board. I didn't have a torch and the fog horn wasn't working either," he added. After the accident, authorities fast-tracked the process of getting him out.
Girish Pant said: "I've been talking to him, and giving him moral support every day. I can't imagine what he went through, being all alone on board the ship." Girish alerted respective authorities and urged them to solve Rawat's issue at the earliest. "Strict action must be taken against such defaulters," he said.
The sailor stated that he would not have been able to make it out alive without Girish's help.
dhanusha@khaleejtimes.com
214 sailors repatriated in 5 months
The Indian Consulate in Dubai helped repatriate 214 Indian sailors in the past six months, Consul-General Vipul told Khaleej Times.
"We've been actively taking up urgent cases with the Federal Transport Authority, and Nirmal's case was especially urgent because his living and working conditions were extremely poor," he said.
The consulate has been providing assistance wherever it can and has also apprised local authorities of these cases for their early resolution. Vipul reiterated that recruitment of sailors should take place only through directorate-general of shipping in India, licensed/registered recruitment and placement services (RPS) entities and the e-migrate system.
The consulate on its website - www.cgidubai.org - has advised sailors to apply due diligence before accepting an employment offer to work on these ships and not to get recruited through unscrupulous agents.
I could not communicate with other ships since there was no electricity on-board. I didn't have a torch and the fog horn wasn't working either."