The Gulf of Mannar, an inlet of the Indian Ocean connecting India and Sri Lanka, is rich in biodiversity and a source of livelihood for both countries’ fishermen. Kachchatheevu, a tiny island in the Palk Strait, a stretch of ocean that divides the two countries, was historically a common fishing ground for Indians and Sri Lankans. The fishing rights of Indians in the region were scrapped in 1976 after the island was ceded to Sri Lanka by India in 1974. Today, Kachchatheevu is a site of frequent arrests of Indian fishermen.
For Indian fishermen in Pamban, crossing the maritime border into Sri Lankan waters is a matter of survival.
The catch on the Indian side has been declining amid climate change, increasing plastic pollution in the sea and the rampant use of mechanised trawlers over decades. Trawlers, which scrape the seabed in their search for fish, destroy the seafloor habitat, including coral reefs. This in turn disrupts breeding cycles. Marine experts also blame trawlers for sea pollution from abandoned nets and fuel spills.
If fishermen return without any fish, they cannot survive,” says P Jesuraja, president of an association of fishermen with mechanised boats in Ramanathapuram district in Tamil Nadu. Jesuraja argues that climate change and rising sea pollution represent the biggest challenges facing Indian fisherfolk.
“The problem in India is plastic waste and not the trawlers,” he says. “Reducing plastic waste will solve half of our problems.”
“About 10 years ago, when we put a fishing net in the sea, we would catch only fish. Nowadays, the amount of fish is less than the plastic waste,” says Marivel, a fisherman from Pamban Island, Tamil Nadu.
Earlier, the rainy season would be good for fishers, including those catching sardines. Now, due to erratic rain patterns, the supply of fresh water has reduced, leading to a sharp decline in sardines, said Marivel. Due to the increasing frequency of cyclones between November and February, fishermen are also unable to go to sea for several days.
As fishermen face falling incomes, women are forced to venture into the deep sea to collect seaweed as an alternative source of income. But that practice too has been affected by climate change.
About a decade ago, women from Pamban Island started collecting seaweed as incomes from fishing began to fall. Marie, a seaweed collector on Pamban, says this year she could collect only about 3kg of seaweed a day, while about 10 years ago, she used to collect 20-25kg a day.
Women are often required to dive up to 3.5 metres (12 feet) under the sea without any protective gear to collect seaweed.
Rising phytoplankton blooms in the sea due to erratic rains and rising sea temperatures are causing seaweed and coral erosion. As a result, small fish are unable to breathe and die on the shore, says Gayatri Usman, station head of Kadal Osai, a community radio station in the region.