Joint action to curb smuggling and sale of banned tobacco products

Banned tobacco products seized during a joint raid by the police and food safety officials. 

‘Spot fine will bring down the sale of gutkha in Coimbatore’

The crackdown by the police and Food Safety Department on the sale of banned tobacco products is yet to cut the inflow of the contraband from other States to Coimbatore.

On Friday, the police seized 214.5 kg of banned tobacco products from a resident of P.N. Pudur on Maruthamalai Road. The seized products included multiple brands of gutka, manufacture and sale of which are banned in many States, including Tamil Nadu.

The police and Food Safety officials cite manpower constraints as a hurdle for full-fledged and dedicated action against the smuggling and sale of banned tobacco products. On an average, five to 10 cases are registered by the Coimbatore city and rural police a day under provisions of the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products (Prohibition of Advertisement and Regulation of Trade and Commerce, Production, Supply and Distribution) Act (COTPA), 2003. The numbers go up on days when special drives are conducted, say officials.

Coimbatore city police alone registered close 1,400 cases under the COTPA in 2019, majority of which were registered against those running petty shops. Sources with the Coimbatore rural police said that around 1,500 cases were registered in the rural limits for the offence in the same period.

In Coimbatore city, Police Commissioner Sumit Sharan has tasked Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) L. Balaji Saravanan to enforce the ban by deploying police personnel attached to the 15 law and order police stations. A senior police officer attached to the city police said that the main challenge in enforcing the ban was manpower constraints. The official admitted that police were also not able to take investigation to the next level to trace the supply chain of the contraband due to the same reason.

Officials with the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) said they were hopeful of bringing down the sale of banned tobacco products as the Food Safety Department recently empowered Designated Officers in each district to issue spot fine to those found stocking or selling the items.

K. Tamilselvan, Designated Officer of the FSSAI in Coimbatore, said that it booked 50 persons, most of them running petty shops and grocery stores, for stocking and selling prohibited tobacco products.

“We expect that the spot fining will bring down the sale of gutkha in Coimbatore as the fine amount slapped on the offender is high. Fine amount to the tune of ₹2.5 lakh was collected from the offenders during special checks conducted to enforce spot fining in the last one month,” he said.

While first time offender is slapped with a fine of ₹5,000, the fine amount doubles to ₹10,000 when a person is caught selling the products for a second time. A fine of ₹25,000 and cancellation of FSSAI’s registration certificate are the penalty for third-time offender.

District Collector K. Rajamani said that a meeting of officials from the police, FSSAI, Revenue Department and the local bodies will be held soon to discuss modalities to enforce the ban.