Two fishermen in a country boat were feared killed after security detail on board a merchant vessel allegedly fired at them off Alapuzha coast this evening, suspecting them to be pirates.
A naval press release tonight said that the personnel onboard Enrica Lexie had allegedly fired on the fishermen mistaking them for pirates.
The vessel informed authorities about the incident.
The Coast Guard then launched two ships Sumar and Lakshmi Bai and an aircraft to trace the ship, located it and asked it to anchor off Kochi for a detailed investigation.
INS Kabra from the Southern Naval Command was also put out to sea for the operation.
The fishermen from Kanyakumari in Tamil Nadu had put out to sea on Wednesday morning from Neendakara in Kollam district.
Xavier Mathias, a fisherman from Kollam, said the ill-fated fishing boat had 11 fishermen and crew.
He said information on the firing incident was received from another boat, whose crew called some fishermen in Neendakara on their mobile phones. The information received was that only two fishermen of the ill-fated boat had been hit in the firing, he said.