00:04Here on Mumbai's coast, one of India's oldest fishing communities is caught between a traditional
00:10harbour increasingly under pressure and a modern one that may not promise a future for everyone.
00:19One of India's oldest fishing harbours, Sassoon Dock, is located in South Mumbai. For more than
00:25a century, it has been the beating heart of the city's seafood trade.
00:39It's busy on the docks, long before the rest of Mumbai has woken up. Boats return laden
00:45with a night's catch. Fish is sorted here. Auctioned, packed and sold. For the Kohli,
00:54Mumbai's indigenous fishing community, this place is more than just a workplace. Sassoon
01:00Dock is their livelihood, identity and a symbol of a way of life.
01:07Vijaya Patre has worked here for 25 years. She has seen the city and its coast change with
01:13a warming planet, bringing a steady drop in catches, even in peak season.
01:20I started when I was very young. Back then, the price of fish wasn't much. Surmai used
01:26to sell for 100, 150 rupees. Now, the same fish goes for up to 1,100. The price has gone
01:33up, but that doesn't mean things have become easier. Retail prices may have climbed over the
01:41for decades, but earnings haven't kept pace. Over the years of almost last 30 years, there was a strong
01:51holy community in Kulaba Sassoon Dock. And that was slowly and slowly being taken over by traders
01:56and processors, you know, who were getting engaged in the fishing industry. For years, Sassoon Dock has
02:03operated through a network of intermediaries. Once the fish left the boats, weighing and pricing were
02:11usually out of the fishermen's control.
02:17What used to happen was this. A boat had one ton of fish. During weighing, 200 to 400 kilos
02:23would somehow get reduced. There used to be differences in the scale.
02:3224 kilometers southeast, the government has built the port of Karanja. A new hub for Mumbai's
02:41fishermen. For decades, Sassoon Dock was their only destination. But now, more and more crews
02:48are shifting their operations to the other side of the bay.
02:57Among the first to switch to Karanja were mainly younger fishermen. The move was easier
03:04for them and more profitable.
03:10Before we made about 60 percent profit, here it's close to 90, so the difference is obvious.
03:17The main reason? Unlike Sassoon Dock, catchers arrive more gradually in Karanja, so prices don't
03:24collapse.
03:26Here there are fewer boats and things are distributed better, so the rate stays stable.
03:33I think the main reason was to take control of the business, you know, which is what Karanja
03:37people or the Koli community has suffered over the last two, three decades.
03:43A seventh generation fisherman from Karanja. Ganesh Nakave has been at the forefront of helping
03:50the community through this transition. He says the main reason for pushing the new port was
03:55simple. To help the Koli community regain control of their trade. Karanja operates without
04:03middlemen. On the grounds of a community-led marketplace, those who catch fish also manage
04:09sales, ensuring fair trade and more cash in hand.
04:18Even when the catch is smaller, selling it ourselves means we get its true value.
04:24But Sassoon Dock is feeling the impact. When boats leave, work disappears. Sopan Raut, making
04:31nets here for nearly 30 years, has seen his income plummet as over half the fishing fleet
04:37moves to Karanja.
04:39Our daily wages used to be anywhere from 1,000 to 1,200 rupees. But now we might not get
04:47work for days. For example, right now, we've been without work for the past eight days.
05:00While Sassoon Dock falls behind, Karanja is reorienting. And digital solutions are catching on.
05:09In 2017, Ganesh Nakave co-founded a digital platform called Blue Catch to log trips, size of catch,
05:17pricing and payments, and attempt to bring traceability into a system where none existed.
05:23Now we can see who paid, how much came in and went out, what the boat earned. Everything's recorded.
05:31I think digital information is the key. Because whatever you are catching should be documented.
05:38Whatever you are earning should be documented. Whatever your financial credit is, you have
05:43a credit history for everyone else. But I have not seen a credit history for a fisherman.
05:47So I think that is what I have been trying with Blue Catch since 2018-19.
05:51Back at Sassoon Dock, many women vendors remain. This is where their customers and credit networks are.
06:00You can't leave the business. There's a yearly tender. You have to decide and commit. You can't just leave and
06:06go elsewhere.
06:08Once you're in, where can you go? And making a living is getting harder for fisherpeople at both ports.
06:14Due to global warming and climate change, the fish catch has fallen. Before it used to be 200 tons. Now
06:24it's just 10 to 20 tons.
06:30We have to go further out to sea. New boats are made for going further to find fish.
06:39So that is the whole challenge what everybody has to understand going forward. That it's not an unlimited ocean available.
06:48There are limited resources in it and we have to adapt to newer ways of fishing so that we survive
06:54and our next generation survives.
06:56Two systems continue to operate in the docks. Located on a coast witnessing increased cyclones, changing currents and reduced fishing
07:05days.
07:06Now that the ocean is no longer predictable, it will take both ancestral knowledge and modern technology to save a
07:14community and the lives it supports.
07:16A wastage plants.
07:18Let them stay in the nowhere.
07:19In this instance, they spread all of course both
07:23to the highest renewable power yes.
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