The catostylid jellyfish, Crambionella annandalei was originally described by Rao (1932) based on a preserved specimen collected from the Andaman Sea. Since then, no detailed taxonomic studies have been conducted and the species is often misidentified. Here, we provide a detailed morphological re-description of C. annandalei from fresh material collected at a variety of locations along the east coast of India. The species can be distinguished from its congeners by a combination of morphological characters, the most important of which are the proportion of terminal club length to oral arm length (0.48 ± 0.031), the proportion of the distal portion of the oral arm to naked proximal portion (7.25 ± 0.268) and the body colour. The occurrence of intra-specific colour variation in fresh specimens was also observed in the present study.

During the survey two species viz, Catostylus mosaicus and Rhizostoma pulmo were found abundantly during March to August with a peak in June–July. The survey revealed the abundance of Catostylus mosaicus over Rhizostoma pulmo. Catostylus mosaicus was being fished at Sonmiani Bay (Balouchistan coast) Gharo Creek, Mirpur Sakro and Keti Bandar (Sindh coast; Indus delta), whereas, Rhizostoma pulmo was fished at Kemari and Keti Bandar. The commercial fishery was also initiated simultaneously on a small scale and jellyfish of both the species mentioned above were caught, processed and exported to south-east Asian countries. This is the first record of the occurrence of Rhizostoma pulmo from the region. A brief description of the species collected from the coastal waters of Pakistan is given along with notes on distribution, ecology, habitat and fishery.