A battle is ensuing in China between the faithful who are performing a religious ritual — of releasing fish into Shanghai’s Huangpu River — and the fishermen who want to catch those same fish for profit or dinner.

Chinese Buddhists perform the ancient practice called “life release” (or Fang Sheng) and set free animals meant for slaughter. The Buddhists perform the act out of compassion.

As the tradition goes, the ritual increases one’s karma and betters the universe. Typically, Buddists perform the act as a religious ceremony.

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“While practiced mainly in Taiwan and Hong Kong until late last century, religion’s resurgence on the mainland has popularized the practice among the growing mass of newly devout Buddhists,” the China Economic Review noted about it back in 2014.

Over 240 million Buddhists, or some 18 percent of the population, live in China. There are approximately 280 Fang Sheng organizations in the country.

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“After prayers, the Buddhists release the creatures into the river to swim free,” The Wall Street Journal reported on May 30 about the ritual in Shanghai.

Dumping fish into the river is a waste, especially when people are poor and need the food, claim fishermen in Shanghai.

“For a while, the Buddhists tried to reason with the fishermen and even convert them. It didn’t work. Tempers flared and fights broke out,” as The Journal piece reported.

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The faithful Buddhists buy up a large quantities of fish before releasing them back into the water.

“To evade fishermen, one Fang Sheng group began hiring boats to release fish offshore, but authorities banned the practice when the boats created a hazard on the busy river,” the article noted. “Another group says prayers, then departs in buses to liberate fish from an undisclosed location.”

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In Shanghai’s Huangpu River, the Buddhists primarily release fish; however, the spiritual can release other animals, such as birds, as part of the practice.

“Despite their good intentions, Fang Sheng practitioners are inadvertently supporting a booming, illegal wildlife trade, causing wild animals to be captured specifically for the purpose of then being released,” theCultureTrip.com noted in October 2016.

For a while, the Buddhists tried to reason with the fishermen and even convert them.

Buddhists are learning of this black market created by the ritual, according to reports.

“On a sunny morning in late June, 50-year-old Liu Yidan prayed to Buddha as usual at Dabei Temple in Tianjin, a coastal municipality near Beijing. But this time she was pleased to see that there were no bird sellers crowding the alley surrounding the temple,” Sixth Tone, a publication that produces information on China, reported in July 2016.

The Fang Sheng practice can be quite pricey.

“Other Buddhists and I spent over a million yuan ($150,000) buying and releasing birds from these sellers from 2008 to 2014,” Liu told Sixth Tone.