The meat of sharks and rays for long is consumed by tribal and coastal people in India.
India has banned the live-finning of sharks and also the export of fins of all shark and ray species.
Ten species are completely protected from any fishing and trade.
But fishing of sharks and rays is continuing, driven in part by legal local meat consumption.
Goa had the highest percentage of shark and ray meat selling restaurants (35.8 per cent), followed by Tamil Nadu (34.6 per cent) and Maharashtra (4.6 per cent).
Goa and Tamil Nadu together accounted for 70 per cent of all restaurants serving shark meat in India.
Some 251.6 tonnes of shark meat are sold every year in India’s restaurants.