Fishing without nets

Karthi P, a 28-year-old mechanical engineer from Tamil Nadu's Nagapattinam, found himself drawn to purse-seine fishing because of lucrative returns. However, his livelihood took a hit in 2020 when purse-seine fishing faced a ban, aimed at appeasing trawl-boat owners and traditional fishermen, leaving Karthi with over 200 mechanised purse-seine boat owners fighting for their livelihoods in Nagapattinam alone. Trapped and frustrated, Karthi's story embodies the human cost of the purse-seine ban, a microcosm of the challenges fishermen face in Tamil Nadu.

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