Journalism of Courage
Nearly three months after the Union Cabinet decided not to change pictorial warnings on tobacco products for one more year and asked the Union Health Ministry to give a wider choice to manufacturers,the Directorate of Advertising and Visual Publicity (DAVP) is ready with more options.
According to officials,the DAVP this month submitted pictures showing different facets of mouth cancer and lung cancer to the Union Health Ministry. The warnings will be notified after Union Health Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad shortlists them.
There are about 4-5 pictures some showing how bad one looks after being infected with mouth cancer and some others showing facets of lung cancer. Once the minister approves the pictures,we will notify them so that the manufacturers get ample time to use them on their tobacco products, said a ministry official.
The warnings are for both smokeless and smoking form of tobacco products.
Under pressure from the tobacco lobby and some ministers who had met informally,the Health Ministry had earlier decided to go the Union Cabinet to take a final call on the warnings.
The ministers had then rejected the previously shortlisted picture of oral cancer,calling it harsh and gory and had asked the Ministry to dilute and delay the warnings.
The earlier warnings were approved after a survey suggested that the existing pictorial warnings – of a picture of a scorpion used on bidi packs and that of a cancer-affected lung on cigarette packs – were not making the desired impact.
The GoM had also asked the DAVP to provide pictorial alternatives that could be used on tobacco products other than the pictures shortlisted by Azad.
This was not the first time that the pictorial warnings had hit a roadblock. After the law was implemented in March 2009,the warnings should have been changed in March 2010 but the government extended the time to December 1,2010.
We are working hard to get the pictures approved as soon as possible so that it is not delayed this time, the sources said. The non-compliance of the order will attract a fine of Rs 5,000 and the product will also be seized.
Statistics show nearly 0.9 million deaths occur in India every year due to tobacco use compared with 5.5 million deaths worldwide.
