The Delhi government has extended the ban for one more year on Gutka, Pan Masala, Flavoured / Scented Tobacco, Kharra and similar products containing tobacco.

In September 2012, State of Delhi banned Gutka and Pan Masala containing tobacco and/or nicotine. After the notification, Gutka manufacturers separated the components like tobacco from Gutka and Pan Masala.

Since the term ‘Gutka and Pan Masala Containing Tobacco’ was used in the notification. The components like tobacco were manufactured and sold in separate pouches after the ban.

The notification was revised in March 2015 to make it more stricter and banned all smokeless tobacco (SLT) products including twin-pack.

Why To Regulate The Smokeless Tobacco?

There were strong recommendations from WHO and South-East Asia Regional Office (WHO-SEARO) to control the smokeless tobacco and its cessation. WHO-SEARO released a study on Oral Tobacco use in South-East Asian Countries.

WHO-SEARO report stated in 2004, “Use of oral tobacco enhances the frequency of public spitting as everyone is to spit after taking oral tobacco and thus increases the chances of communicable disease like Tuberculosis. Non-spatters have all rights to protect themselves from the hazard of public spitting.”.

Global Adult Tobacco Survey 2016-17 reported, “India is the third largest tobacco producing nation and second largest consumer of tobacco world-wide. One feature of tobacco related mortality in India is the high incidence of oral cancer, exceeding even that of lung cancer and accounting for almost half of all oral cancers in the world”.

Currently, India is running a National Strategic Plan (NSP) for TB elimination 2017-2025. NSP states that India has been engaged in Tuberculosis (TB control activities for more than 50 years). Yet TB continues to be India’s severest health crisis. TB kills an estimated 480,000 Indians every year and more than 1,400 every day.

Misbeliefs Related To Smokeless Tobacco:

Global Youth Tobacco Survey, Uttar Pradesh, India – 2002 reported that there was a widespread misconception that tobacco is good for the teeth. Many companies took advantage of this misconception by packaging and positioning their products as dental care products. A laboratory test of five samples of red tooth powder (lal dantmanjan) that did not declare tobacco as an ingredient, found a tobacco content of 9.3-248 mg per gram of tooth powder.