india

Updated: May 22, 2019 16:39 IST

The Andhra Pradesh police sounded a high alert on Tuesday at Krishnapatnam port and the Sriharikota Space Research Centre (SHAR) in Nellore, after an abandoned speed boat with Sri Lanka’s registration number was found close to the coast.

According to marine police inspector K Mallikarjuna Rao, some fishermen found the speed boat about 4 km away from the shore in Pannapudi Pathavuru under Vidavuluru police station limits on May 18 and they brought it to the shore on Tuesday and informed the police.

The boat’s location is about 10-15 km away from the Krishnapatnam port and 50 km north of Sriharikota. It was fitted with a Yamaha engine and contained two oil cans of 20-litre capacity with a Sri Lankan sticker on it, an empty water bottle of five-litre capacity, a blanket and a few burnt cigarettes and beedis.

The fishermen reportedly removed the engine, the costliest part of the boat. “No other suspicious material was found in the boat,” Rao told local reporters.

The Vidavuluru police, who registered a case under CrPC Section 102, alerted the security forces at the Krishnapatnam port and also SHAR, where the PSLV C46 was launched on Wednesday morning. Similar alerts were sounded by the Coast Guard police and the Tamil Nadu police and fisheries department.

Vidavuluru SI P Nagababu said a thorough search had been launched across the district to check whether any strangers had entered the area through the sea route.