Pressure mounts on India’s oral products

The Maharashtra State Food and Drug Administration (MSFDA) commissioner, Mahesh Zagade, has called on his counterparts in India’s other states to consider enforcing bans on the manufacture and sale of gutkha and pan masala, according to a story in the most recent issue of the BBM Bommidala newsletter.

At the same time, Zagade has reportedly written to the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India urging it to convene a meeting of all of the FDAs in the country to ensure “proper implementation of the law on smokeless tobacco products, and to follow the leaf of the [Maharashtra] state and outlaw all processed and packaged [smokeless] tobacco in whatever form.”

The state recently became the first to impose a blanket ban on all chewing tobacco (zarda, khaini, kharra, masheri, mawa, etc.) and scented supari (pan masala and supari mix). It has moved to shut down all manufacturing units within the state and to stop these products entering the state from outside.