"We have always lived on these islands and gone to sea. How can the state say it does not belong to us?”

A resident of Chinnapalam, a village in Tamil Nadu’s Rameswaram, S. Pandiammal, 44, starts her day at 5 am. She cleans and cooks before her husband S. Selvaraj returns from fishing. She spends two hours collecting the crabs he harvested and also disentangles nets. “The first time I went into the sea, I was eight years old… I felt like vomiting. You get used to it, but I never liked it,” she shares. 

Located along the northern Gulf of Mannar, women of Chinnapaalam have historically fished and collected seaweed. “This is the only village where both men and women go to fish,” Pandiammal says. When the region was declared a marine-protected area in 1989, the livelihoods of small fishers, especially the women, were affected. “We have always lived on these islands and gone to sea. How can the state say it does not belong to us?” This injustice motivated her to join the Ramanathapuram Fishers Union when she was 22 to advocate for Chinnapaalam’s fishers’ right to the seas.

The Union now has over 4,200 members—1,809 are women—and has demanded state licences for its seaweed collectors. Without licenses, women whose livelihoods are already affected by climate events, face even greater income uncertainty. Pandiammal recognises the disproportionate impact on women fishers, who also bear the burden of domestic work, and addresses urgent concerns to the panchayat. “In June, we met the fisheries minister to close the [alcohol] shop [owned by the state government],” Pandiammal says. “Men waste their earnings on liquor, and women have to earn and take care of children.”

Pandiammal has no illusions about the security of fish work. “I had decided that my sons won’t fish. So one teaches while the other is a supervisor in a crab factory. There is no fish in the sea and the next generation needs permanent salaries. They have to study.”

Yet, in the village, even graduates struggle to find jobs and return to fishing. “There is a need for our people in the fisheries and forest department jobs. Right now, if we need any scheme approvals or support, we have to wait for signatures from the officials. Would we have to if [officials were from the community]?” she questions.