Bhubaneswar: Union education minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Friday wrote to external affairs minister S Jaishankar, seeking urgent intervention to trace and rescue Sarthak Mohapatra, a marine engineer from Odisha who went missing while onboard a container vessel near Mauritius.In his letter, Pradhan said Mohapatra was reported missing under unexplained circumstances from the vessel EA Jersey on the morning of Feb 3, while the ship was transiting about 135 nautical miles east of Mauritius.
Describing the disappearance as “sudden and mysterious”, Pradhan urged Jaishankar to personally look into the case. The education minister also wrote to Sarbananda Sonowal, minister of ports, shipping and waterways, on the issue.BJD chief Naveen Patnaik and party MP Debashish Samantaray have also sought Jaishankar’s intervention in rescuing Mohapatra.Meanwhile, the ship’s authorities said an extensive search and rescue operation is underway in the Indian Ocean to locate the 22-year-old cadet. The operation, coordinated by the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre (MRCC), Mauritius, involved multiple surface vessels and aerial assets using internationally recognised search patterns.
