IWN Report — Sunday, 27 September 2026
Nearly 500 volunteers spent International Coastal Cleanup Day hauling 1,320 kilograms of plastic bottles, fishing net and rope off beaches in Gujarat, Goa and Kerala, work the Wildlife Trust of India organised as part of its long-running effort to keep that same debris out of the water where whale sharks feed.
The clean-ups on 19 and 20 September ran along the same coastline as WTI’s Pan India Whale Shark Conservation Project, which began in Gujarat in 2004 and later expanded to Kerala and Lakshadweep in 2017 and to Goa in 2025.
The whale shark carries Schedule I protection under India’s Wildlife Protection Act, the country’s strictest tier. WTI’s advocacy secured that listing in 2001, when the whale shark became the first fish species in India to receive it. The species is now assessed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List, having lost more than half its global population over the last 75 years to targeted fishing, bycatch and collisions with ships.
The heaviest haul came from the Veraval-Somnath coast in Gujarat, where nearly 350 volunteers collected about 800 kilograms of marine debris. The drive brought together the Indian Coast Guard‘s Veraval station, the Gujarat Forest Department, the Central Institute of Fisheries Technology and the Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute, plus Choksi College of Arts and Commerce, the College of Fisheries Science in Veraval, and Tata Chemicals, WTI’s partner on the whale shark project.
In Goa, 104 volunteers gathered at Palolem beach in Canacona and removed 260 kilograms of waste, working alongside the Goa Forest Department, the state’s Directorate of Fisheries and the Canacona Municipal Council.
Kerala’s contribution came from two separate drives. At Vettucaud beach in Thiruvananthapuram, students from Rosa Mystica CBSE School took part through Malayala Manorama’s Nalla Padam programme. Further north, at Azhikode beach and harbour in Thrissur, a team from Christ College’s ASCE unit was joined by the local MLA, K. K. Valsaraj.
Sources: Wildlife Trust of India · WTI: Pan India Whale Shark Conservation Project · WTI: Whale Shark Schedule I Listing · IUCN Red List