Sea animals feel pain and fear just like dogs, cats and humans, but many people think of sea animals as little more than swimming vegetables. Because people don’t realize they suffer, marine animals suffer unexplained cruelty when they are caught on hooks or with nets, kept in live-animal markets, or raised in fish farms. According to government figures, about 6 million metric tonnes of fish are slaughtered in India every year.

Fishermen use huge boats and nets to catch tons of marine animals at once. Fishing lines and nets make no distinction between target species and non-target animals – they attract all animals in their path. Unwanted animals, known as “by-catch,” would be thrown into the sea—dead and dying—after the nets were hauled in and sorted. On some fishing boats, 90 percent of animals caught in nets are by-catch.