New Delhi, 6 May : The Government of India today gave an undertaking in the Supreme Court that pictorial health warnings on packages of tobacco products would be mandatory from 31 May 2009. The May 3 notification which was issued by the Government stated that 40% of the pictorial health warnings would be issued on one side.
Additional Solicitor General Gopal Subramanium gave the undertaking in the court when the issue came up for hearing on a petition filed by the Health For Millions Trust against the Union of India and two other leading tobacco companies of India came up for hearing in the Supreme Court today.
The counsel for the petitioner was Senior Advocate Indira Jaisingh while the Union of India was represented by ASG Gopal Subramanium. A Bench of Justice B.N. Agarwal and Justice G.S.Singhvi was hearing the case.
Ms Indira Jaisingh said the Group of Ministers (GoM) had more than half a dozen times delayed and diluted the implementation of the pictorial warning on tobacco packages. She also said that during the pendency of the case, the Government had delayed and diluted the pictorial health warnings. She said that the issue of pictorial health warnings is a public health matter and the health ministry’s views is paramount in this case.
Yesterday the Bench had asked the Government to place before it the minutes of the GoM meeting held on 3 February 2009.
The bench appeared satisfied with the undertaking of the ASG and said that Government of India should implement the new notification of May 3 with effect from 31 May. The court also passed an injunction saying " no other court across India should pass any order which is inconsistent with this order".
With today’s judgement, it is now mandatory for all tobacco products to display pictorial health warnings on its packages from 31 May. All tobacco products which are being retailed in India,, including those being imported, have to display pictorial health warnings from 1 June 2009 failing which the manufacturers and retailers will be attracting severe penalties under the provisions of COTPA 2003.
Ms Bhavna B Mukhopadhyay, Sr Director, VHAI said, “This is an important victory for public health advocates who have been demanding the implementation of pictorial health warnings on all tobacco packets. Although the warnings are considerably weaker than what was visualized originally in 2006, bidi smokers and tobacco chewers who currently see no warnings on the packets will be fairly sensitized through these 40% sized pictorial warnings.
From 31 May 2009, manufacturers of tobacco products would be fined if their products do not display pictorial health warnings.
WHY PICTORIAL HEALTH WARNINGS ON TOBACCO PACKAGES
Pictorial warnings on tobacco products are intended to increase consumer knowledge of the deadly health effects of tobacco consumption, to encourage cessation and to discourage uptake. In India they also break the linguistic and cultural barrier, in addition to informing the illiterate population (a large proportion of this segment smokes bidis) about the harmful effects of tobacco use.
Pictorial warnings are an effective tool internationally to combat tobacco addiction. Around 17 countries including Brazil, Australia, Canada, Chile, Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Uruguay, Venezuela and a number of other developed nations have successfully introduced picture-based warnings and many of them have gorier images on the packs.
In addition to the COTPA, as a party to the World Health Organization Framework Convention on Tobacco Control – an international treaty mandating parties to take steps to address the tobacco epidemic – India is legally required to implement health warnings. As recently as November, 2008 India participated in a Conference of the Parties to the treaty that unanimously adopted guidelines that warnings should cover at least 50 percent of the display areas and use pictures or pictograms.
Scientific studies have found that prominent health warnings lead to greater awareness of the health risks of tobacco use and increased desire to quit. A study published in the March, 2007 issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine compared widely varying health warnings in four countries and found that large, pictorial warnings, such as those in Canada, are more effective than small, text-only warnings such as those in the United States.
About Voluntary Health Association of India (VHAI)
Voluntary Health Association of India (VHAI) is a non-profit, registered society formed in the year 1970. It is a federation of 27 State Voluntary Health Associations, linking together 4500 public health and development institutions and more than 100,000 grassroots-level community health workers across the country.
VHAI advocates for people-centered health policies through policy research and strives to build a strong health movement to ensure social justice, equity and human rights in the provision and distribution of public health goods to all, with emphasis on underprivileged.
