Sunday's tsunami has not only caused a great loss of life in India's southern state of Tamil Nadu, but also inflicted a heavy blow to its fishing industry, fishing industry sources said here on Friday.

The sources said the killer waves have fully or partly damaged around 7,000 mechanized boats and 30,000 country crafts, which accounted for around 80 percent of the total fishing boats in the state.

The annual marine production is around 400,000 tons but now the production will plummet by about 30 percent as fishermen may not venture into sea for three months. This, in turn, will hit the export of marine products, which now account for 23 billion Rupees (53 million US dollars) a year.

The official sources said that out of 400,000 tons of marine products, nearly 95 percent are exported.

Even if the boats were repaired it would take at least three months for the fishermen to take to the sea. They were yet to recover from Sunday's calamity. Some fishermen have lost their relatives and some lost their properties.

According to the sources, nearly 700,000 people were affected by the tidal waves, of which 85 percent were fishermen.

Tamil Nadu government said on Friday that 6,238 people have died of the tsunami so far, with Nagapattinam district alone recording 4,379 deaths.