Pan masala ban: more States follow Kerala - THE HINDU

Patna High Court rejects petition challenging the ban

Though the Kerala High Court is yet to consider the cases filed by manufacturers of gutka and pan masala products challenging the ban imposed by the government on the sale, manufacture, storage and distribution of pan masala and related products in the State, the State of Bihar has fully endorsed the ban, with the Patna High Court throwing out a writ petition filed by the pan masala manufacturers, seeking a stay on the ban.

Third State

Bihar is the third State, after Madhya Pradesh and Kerala, to impose a ban on the manufacture, sale, distribution of gutka, pan masala and its variants, utilising the provisions in the Food Safety and Standards (Prohibition and Restriction on Sale) Regulation 2011.

The petition filed by the gutka manufacturers had claimed that manufacture and sale of tobacco and nicotine-containing products such as pan masala and gutka were permitted but regulated by the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products (Prohibition of Advertisement and Regulation of Trade and Commerce, Production, Supply and Distribution) Act, 2003.

However, the Patna High Court pointed out that the ban order on pan masala was in interest of public health and that it was legal as it conformed to the provisions of the Food Safety Act.

In Kerala, the ban on pan masala products was issued on May 22, utilising the provisions in the Food Safety and Standards (Prohibition and Restriction on Sale) Regulation 2011. Regulation 2.3.4 says that ‘tobacco and nicotine shall not be used as ingredients in any food products’. Section 30 of the Food Safety Standards Act 2006 says that the Commissioner of Food Safety shall “prohibit in the interest of public health, the manufacture, storage, distribution or sale of any article of food, either in the whole of the State or any area or part thereof for such period, not exceeding one year…”.

The ban on pan masala products in Kerala was effected by combining both these provisions under the law.

Six cases

At least six cases have since then been filed by the gutka and pan masala manufacturers in the Kerala High Court, demanding that the ban be stayed.

The High Court had declined to stay the ban order but the Division Bench referred back to a single judge, all writ petitions filed by the All Kerala Tobacco Dealers Association and other tobacco dealers challenging the ban order on pan masala, so that ‘the petitions may be

disposed of on merit’.

The government had submitted that many products containing tobacco were being sold without mentioning the ingredients on the label, passing these off as ‘mouth freshners’. Children were the biggest consumers of these smokeless or chewing tobacco products, it had been submitted.

Following Kerala’s example, States such as Maharashtra and Himachal Pradesh too have now banned pan masala under the Food Safety Act and wherever the ban was imposed, the pan masala manufacturers have been quick to challenge it in court.