India moving to cut off tobacco-company goodwill

The Indian government is considering a raft of new anti-tobacco measures; one of which would ‘discourage’ tobacco manufacturers from earning goodwill through their corporate social responsibility activities, according to a story by Ritika Chopra for The Economic Times.

At the same time, the new measures, amendments to the Cigarettes & Other Tobacco Products Act (COTPA), would extend the ban on tobacco promotion to media platforms such as mobile phones and the Internet.

And they would disallow restaurants, hotels and domestic airports from creating designated smoking areas.

The new measures were said to include a clause to reduce interference by tobacco companies in the conception and implementation of anti-tobacco policies, a provision to create special courts to try offences under COTPA, and a plan to set up a new monitoring authority called the National Tobacco Control Organization.

The ministry wants, also, to introduce a new section empowering the government to suspend or cancel the licenses of tobacco manufacturers, importers, suppliers, distributers or sellers for violating COTPA provisions relating to the sale of cigarettes to minors or to those concerning bans on advertisements and the inclusion of health warnings on cigarette packs.

The government said the health ministry had accepted most of the recommendations made by an expert panel on curbing tobacco consumption, and that the ministry was preparing a cabinet note on the final amendments to COTPA, which was due to go before the cabinet in four or five weeks.