A study on the weather pattern known as El Nino says it has had a catastrophic effect on coral reefs on India's western coast.

The study, published in the magazine Current Science, said more than eighty percent of the reefs near the Lakshawadeep Islands and eleven percent of those in the Gulf of Kutch had been affected by discolouring known as bleaching.

One of the scientists involved in the study Rohan Arthur said that many corals that had suffered bleaching, eventually died.

He said the demise of the corals would seriously affect underwater wildlife.

According to the study, the bleaching on India's western coast was caused by a rise in sea temperatures due to the effects of El Nino in 1993.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service