elgoog
Contributor
Everything I'm posting below is based on my personal experiences only from growing up in a massive metropolitan city in India (Mumbai) in a middle class family. Due to that and, to some extent, having lived in the US for over a decade, my opinions and views of the social and cultural issues in play here may be unique and, most certainly, are mine alone. I've not been to the Andaman Islands but have been to other similarly remote locations in India. I'm going to try and give some context on the factors that are uniquely Indian to the mostly-American/European SBers reading this thread and trying to make sense of this tragic incident.
-> The police reaction
Arresting everyone even remotely related to an incident is pretty common, even more so for serious events like this. Lots of times people are thrown into the lockup and beat up in the hopes someone will talk and confess to something. Google "India police brutality" and "India police interrogation". This is also done to show that the police are "doing something" - they're under a ton of scrutiny and simultaneously accused of doing nothing as well as overdoing things. I've seen this happen even for things like thefts, burglaries, circuit room fires, car break-ins, etc. Almost always low-income men in the vicinity (cleaners, street workers, security guards) are subject to this and they've told us that they were beat up and automatically considered suspects because of their social and financial standing in the community. I'm not saying that's what happened here but it's easy for me to think of this scenario playing out with the DMs, shop owner, boat captain, tank fillers, shop helpers, etc.
One of the posted articles mentions the local police department filed an FIR after the family went to them. An FIR stands for First Information Report and what this means is the police think what happened is a cognisable offence (a serious crime was committed) and they will proceed with arrests and investigation without any approvals or warrants issued by a court of law. There is a lot of room for abuse here aside from the implication that it automatically assumes criminal behavior.
-> Did the decedent know how to swim?
This is taken for granted by many of us but is not a common skill in India. Google "India people swimming". I learned to swim when I was 5 and even to this day, in my very large extended family, I'm the only one who knows how to do so. This, however, doesn't stop people from going into the water. They think they're safe because they're only going in waist or chest deep but all it takes is a little unevenness in the bottom, a small wave or something to knock you over and put you in real danger. Unfortunately, this very real danger is all but unknown to the majority of people there resulting in a shocking number of drowning deaths every year. The house I grew up in was a 10min bike ride from the beach and I was there at least a couple of times a week. I have personally seen people die this way as well as helped people get their head above water. In the latter cases, they didn't even realize how much danger they were in and just kept on doing what they were doing. I used to try to explain it to them but stopped after I got yelled enough times for "interfering with their fun".
The owner of the dive shop commented that the decedent was found in 2m (~6ft) of water after a try dive which had a shore entry. It's highly unlikely that the beach itself has treacherous conditions based on this report but is consistent with someone walking in to a "safe" depth, losing their footing for whatever reason and drowning. The first article @DandyDon posted mentions the decedent was from Nagpur - this is a town in the interior of the country so it seems unlikely that he was experienced dealing with any kind of wave action, sand moving under your feet, etc.
Another thing that complicates matters is the lifeguard situation. Only the very touristy beaches in India have them and even this has been just in the last 5-7 years. Due to the newness, most people just ignore their warnings and advice and, in many cases, treat them the way I was when they try to help. I'm not familiar with the beach in question and not sure if it's touristy enough to have a lifeguard, regardless of whether that would have helped in this situation or not.
-> Rescue services
Emergency services (or lack thereof) are also a factor to consider. Medical facilities and practitioners tend to be pretty good all over the country but may not be as easily accessible depending on where you are. North Bay Beach looks like it's far enough away from Port Blair (where I would expect the nearest developed medical facilities to be) that getting someone there in case of an emergency would take a significant amount of time. Medical evacuation is non-existent and even ambulances are not staffed or equipped to deal with anything. In fact, the word for "ambulance" in many Indian languages literally translates to "corpse vehicle".
-> SCUBA in India
SCUBA diving in India is extremely under-developed but the activity has become immensely popular with the upwardly mobile Indian middle class. This results in a lot of them wanting to do DSD dives while on vacation. Very few end up taking it on as a hobby, it's mostly seen as an activity you do once to check off a list so you can talk about it and say you did it. Multiple people in my extended family have done this and, coupled with the lack of swimming ability or even just comfort in the water, it creates some dangerous situations and assumptions. From what I gathered from them, they were basically just walked around in the water holding the DMs hand the entire time. They were also told that it's super safe and that the equipment will float them to the surface and prevent them from drowning. In addition, the DM is there the whole time so focus on having fun and don't worry about anything. The reason I mention all this is that it creates a false sense of security in the water and the belief that the diver doesn't have to do anything or be responsible for their own safety because the DM will do everything for them.
I think this explains the completely opposite views expressed in the comments of the newspaper article. One comment mentions that because they paid money, the dive op and/or "security people" should have been fully responsible for the safety of the customers. Diving or not, this is a very common attitude in India and is sometimes taken as a license to do unsafe things because the person you paid will be there to get you out of a jam because, well, that's what you paid them for. The other comment makes mention of the op being shut down by the administration. The Andaman Islands are pretty remote and not a primary vacation destination. You have to fly there and many Indian tourists prefer to go to SE Asia instead as it's the same amount of travel effort for much more developed destinations. It seems like there's an implication that the dive op will be shut down to show that the government is doing everything it can to make the Islands a safer vacation destination for everyone. Callous as it sounds, it is not in their best interest to blame the deceased tourist, regardless of the truth.
-> Liability concerns
This is an extremely gray area. More than than the presence of liability laws, I am more suspect of the ability or desire to enforce them. From what I've seen, this has been non-existent even in higher profile cases of accidents involving large companies. Even with a lot of publicity and outcry about the deaths, not much happened. Of course, this could very likely also be due to the defendant's ability to have things swept under the rug. Even if this incident went to court, the Indian court system takes years, if not decades, to do anything.
The case of Steve Martin in Malta was mentioned in this context - I have no reason to believe that such individual liability is expected at all in India. My understanding is that unless you're actually paid to do something, you're not responsible or liable for anything or anyone.
It's always hard to read A&I threads on SB. To me, they all feel like something bad happened to "one of us". Hopefully, my post doesn't derail this thread but, in all honesty, I highly doubt any more useful information will be forthcoming.
-> The police reaction
Arresting everyone even remotely related to an incident is pretty common, even more so for serious events like this. Lots of times people are thrown into the lockup and beat up in the hopes someone will talk and confess to something. Google "India police brutality" and "India police interrogation". This is also done to show that the police are "doing something" - they're under a ton of scrutiny and simultaneously accused of doing nothing as well as overdoing things. I've seen this happen even for things like thefts, burglaries, circuit room fires, car break-ins, etc. Almost always low-income men in the vicinity (cleaners, street workers, security guards) are subject to this and they've told us that they were beat up and automatically considered suspects because of their social and financial standing in the community. I'm not saying that's what happened here but it's easy for me to think of this scenario playing out with the DMs, shop owner, boat captain, tank fillers, shop helpers, etc.
One of the posted articles mentions the local police department filed an FIR after the family went to them. An FIR stands for First Information Report and what this means is the police think what happened is a cognisable offence (a serious crime was committed) and they will proceed with arrests and investigation without any approvals or warrants issued by a court of law. There is a lot of room for abuse here aside from the implication that it automatically assumes criminal behavior.
-> Did the decedent know how to swim?
This is taken for granted by many of us but is not a common skill in India. Google "India people swimming". I learned to swim when I was 5 and even to this day, in my very large extended family, I'm the only one who knows how to do so. This, however, doesn't stop people from going into the water. They think they're safe because they're only going in waist or chest deep but all it takes is a little unevenness in the bottom, a small wave or something to knock you over and put you in real danger. Unfortunately, this very real danger is all but unknown to the majority of people there resulting in a shocking number of drowning deaths every year. The house I grew up in was a 10min bike ride from the beach and I was there at least a couple of times a week. I have personally seen people die this way as well as helped people get their head above water. In the latter cases, they didn't even realize how much danger they were in and just kept on doing what they were doing. I used to try to explain it to them but stopped after I got yelled enough times for "interfering with their fun".
The owner of the dive shop commented that the decedent was found in 2m (~6ft) of water after a try dive which had a shore entry. It's highly unlikely that the beach itself has treacherous conditions based on this report but is consistent with someone walking in to a "safe" depth, losing their footing for whatever reason and drowning. The first article @DandyDon posted mentions the decedent was from Nagpur - this is a town in the interior of the country so it seems unlikely that he was experienced dealing with any kind of wave action, sand moving under your feet, etc.
Another thing that complicates matters is the lifeguard situation. Only the very touristy beaches in India have them and even this has been just in the last 5-7 years. Due to the newness, most people just ignore their warnings and advice and, in many cases, treat them the way I was when they try to help. I'm not familiar with the beach in question and not sure if it's touristy enough to have a lifeguard, regardless of whether that would have helped in this situation or not.
-> Rescue services
Emergency services (or lack thereof) are also a factor to consider. Medical facilities and practitioners tend to be pretty good all over the country but may not be as easily accessible depending on where you are. North Bay Beach looks like it's far enough away from Port Blair (where I would expect the nearest developed medical facilities to be) that getting someone there in case of an emergency would take a significant amount of time. Medical evacuation is non-existent and even ambulances are not staffed or equipped to deal with anything. In fact, the word for "ambulance" in many Indian languages literally translates to "corpse vehicle".
-> SCUBA in India
SCUBA diving in India is extremely under-developed but the activity has become immensely popular with the upwardly mobile Indian middle class. This results in a lot of them wanting to do DSD dives while on vacation. Very few end up taking it on as a hobby, it's mostly seen as an activity you do once to check off a list so you can talk about it and say you did it. Multiple people in my extended family have done this and, coupled with the lack of swimming ability or even just comfort in the water, it creates some dangerous situations and assumptions. From what I gathered from them, they were basically just walked around in the water holding the DMs hand the entire time. They were also told that it's super safe and that the equipment will float them to the surface and prevent them from drowning. In addition, the DM is there the whole time so focus on having fun and don't worry about anything. The reason I mention all this is that it creates a false sense of security in the water and the belief that the diver doesn't have to do anything or be responsible for their own safety because the DM will do everything for them.
I think this explains the completely opposite views expressed in the comments of the newspaper article. One comment mentions that because they paid money, the dive op and/or "security people" should have been fully responsible for the safety of the customers. Diving or not, this is a very common attitude in India and is sometimes taken as a license to do unsafe things because the person you paid will be there to get you out of a jam because, well, that's what you paid them for. The other comment makes mention of the op being shut down by the administration. The Andaman Islands are pretty remote and not a primary vacation destination. You have to fly there and many Indian tourists prefer to go to SE Asia instead as it's the same amount of travel effort for much more developed destinations. It seems like there's an implication that the dive op will be shut down to show that the government is doing everything it can to make the Islands a safer vacation destination for everyone. Callous as it sounds, it is not in their best interest to blame the deceased tourist, regardless of the truth.
-> Liability concerns
This is an extremely gray area. More than than the presence of liability laws, I am more suspect of the ability or desire to enforce them. From what I've seen, this has been non-existent even in higher profile cases of accidents involving large companies. Even with a lot of publicity and outcry about the deaths, not much happened. Of course, this could very likely also be due to the defendant's ability to have things swept under the rug. Even if this incident went to court, the Indian court system takes years, if not decades, to do anything.
The case of Steve Martin in Malta was mentioned in this context - I have no reason to believe that such individual liability is expected at all in India. My understanding is that unless you're actually paid to do something, you're not responsible or liable for anything or anyone.
It's always hard to read A&I threads on SB. To me, they all feel like something bad happened to "one of us". Hopefully, my post doesn't derail this thread but, in all honesty, I highly doubt any more useful information will be forthcoming.
