Journal of the Marine Biological Association of India

most important species of the genus Charybdis.It is widely distributed in the Indo-Pacific region from Japan to China to Australia in the east, to eastern and southern Africa, Gulf of Oman and Arabian Gulf in the west, encompassing Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka and Indonesia (Stephenson et al., 1957;Stephenson, 1972;Apel and Spiridonov, 1998;Ng, 1998).Recently the species has been reported from the Mediterranean Sea for the first time, most probably the introduction vector must be a merchant ship (Abello and Hispano, 2006).The species can be easily distinguished with prominent white cross on the median part of the dorsal carapace and legs and pincers with numerous scattered white spots.It grows to a maximum size of 20 cm in carapace width and prefers to inhabit area of sandy to sandy muddy substrates at depths from 30 to 60m (Ng, 1998).The crab is often landed by bottom trawls along with other portunids from certain pockets along the Indian coast and fishing season varies from place to place.Because of the large size and market demand it is