THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The family of the city-based engineer Manikuttan, who is suspected to have died in a blast on board the ship he worked, has sought the intervention of Chief Minister Oommen Chandy in bringing his mortal remains back home. The Chief Minister himself had called up the family after he came to know of the family’s plight through media reports and offered his help on Monday. Following this, Manikuttan’s family members met the CM in person and expressed their grievances. Following the meeting, Chandy forwarded a request to the office of the Minister of State for Overseas Indian Affairs Vayalar Ravi seeking a speedy solution to their problem. According to Manoharan Thampi, the elder brother of Manikuttan, the latest word from his employers, Noha Marine Private Limited, under whom Manikuttan was on a six-month contract, was that they have not been able to recover the bodies of all the victims of the blast from the remains of the ship. However, this contradicted their earlier statement that all the bodies were recovered on Friday and there remained only a few official formalities before dispatching the bodies. As many as five persons, including Manikuttan, 31, had gone missing from the tanker vessel ITB Jackson, sailing near the coast of Nigeria on September 4. Since then, Manikuttan’s family have been waiting for his body to carry out the last rites. Manoharan Thampi alleged that the approach of the company towards the whole incident was dubious. ‘’They were trying to downplay the incident right from the start. They did not even inform us about the accident in time,’’ he said. He also said that they have been informed that the Nigerian Government had also initiated a probe into the matter after the allegations that the ship was in fact not transporting oil as the company claimed.
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