Panaji: Fish consignments from Maharashtra's Sindhudurg district will be ferried to Goa under police escort, Chief Minister Laxmikant Parsekar said on Wednesday.
The announcement came after a series of flashpoints among fish traders from both the coastal states over the last one week.
Parsekar told reporters at his official residence that he had spoken to Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and Revenue Minister Eknath Khadse and assured them of providing police escorts to fish consignments from Malvan, a fishing village in Sindhudurg district, to Goa's wholesale fish markets.
"We will provide police protection to the fish coming in from Maharashtra," Parsekar said, after meeting a delegation of wholesale fish vendors from Goa earlier on Wednesday.
The wholesale fish vendors met Parsekar to protest after Goa-based fish trawler owners from the Cutbona fish jetty in South Goa, stopped fish consignments from entering the state over the last two days, resulting in the shortage of fish, as well as driving up its prices in the state, where fish curry and rice is a staple meal.
The Cutbona trawler owners had claimed that their counterparts in Malvan had attacked some of the Goan trawler operators, who were fishing in the sea off Maharashtra last week.
"These things should not have happened. But we have to allow fish from neighbouring states to be sold in Goa. The police protection will continue until the problem is resolved...I am also in touch with the top Maharashtra policemen," Parsekar said.
Around 30 tons of fish is sourced from the Malvan fishing jetty and sold in Goa every day. Over the last few years, Goa is facing the prospect of a fish famine, largely due to over-fishing and pollution in the waters off the state's coastline.
