REPORT ON OCEANOGRAPHY 39 



work is being done is with a strong bias to biological and fisheries 

 topics. Plans are afoot, however, for the eventual setting up of an 

 Institute of Oceanography to cover both biological and physical-chem- 

 ical aspects. 



During the British administration, considerable amount of ocean- 

 ographic work was carried out by Col. R. B. S. Sewell while he was 

 Surgeon Naturalist to the Government of India and later on Director 

 of the Zoological Survey of India. He studied the temperature and 

 salinity of the waters around India down to 500 fathoms depth and 

 the results were published in a series of papers. During the "John 

 Murray" Expedition which was led by Sewell, an attempt was made 

 to carry out a complete investigation of the physio-chemical characters 

 of the sea water as well as of the fauna and the general topography of 

 the Arabian Sea and Gulf of Oman. After the country attained inde- 

 pendence, more attention is being paid to oceanographic research and a 

 beginning is being made in sponsoring work relating to this through, 

 the various governmental agencies and universities. 



In view of the great importance attached to Geophysical problems, 

 the Government of India constituted the Central Board of Geophysics 

 early in 1949 and a special committee for Oceanography has also been 

 set up by this body. One of the chief centres where oceanographic 

 work is initiated is the Central Marine Fisheries Research Station, Man- 

 dapam (S. India). 



The oceanographic studies carried out in the Central Marine Fish- 

 eries Research Station are with a definite bias to the development of 

 fisheries, although a certain amount of pure scientific studies is under- 

 taken for a complete understanding of the marine environment support- 

 ing the fisheries. Attention is centered around chemical and biological 

 aspects at present. The fluctuations in the nutrient salts, oxygen, salin- 

 ity, temperature variations, etc. in the inshore waters; bacterial flora 

 and their role in the food chain of the sea; qualitative and semi- 

 quantitative study of the phyto- and zoo-plankton, their distribution 

 and their variations in time and space, bottom fauna, etc., some of the 

 organic production in the waters around India, have been started. As 

 a result of collaboration with the Indian Naval Vessels patrolling coastal 

 waters, it was possible for the Station to collect hydrological data (tem- 

 perature, salinity and pH) at about 25 stations in the Bay of Bengal 

 and readings were also taken with the Bathythermograph of the tem- 

 perature at different depths. Very interesting results on the thermo- 

 clines at the head of the Bay of Bengal have been obtained. A scheme 

 for the collection of water samples from areas traversed by Indian 

 Naval Vessels is already in existence, by which Naval Vessels send to 



