Pictorial warning on tobacco products: SC refuses to stay Centre’s notification

Tribune News Service
New Delhi, July 16

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to stay the Centre’s fresh notification stipulating rotation of images of cancer patients on the packets of tobacco products, saying a large number of people were falling prey to oral cancer. 

Scheduled to come into effect from September 1, the notification mandates packets to carry a ‘Quit Today Call’ number to help those quit tobacco products.

Tobacco companies had approached the top court against the amended notification, accusing the government of violating its order passed in January when it had stayed a Karnataka High Court verdict that had quashed the government notification.

The notification necessitated a statutory health warning to be printed on packages of cigarettes, pan masala and other tobacco products.

Cigarettes and other Tobacco Products (Packaging and Labelling Rules) of 2008, as amended in 2014, required a statutory health warning to be printed on packages of cigarettes, pan masala, and other tobacco products covering at least 85 per cent of principal display area.

The notification amended the 2014 Cigarettes and other Tobacco Products (Packaging and Labelling Rules) and mandated replacement of current image of a person’s throat with a hole with more “gruesome pictures of a person’s lips with diseased and purulent growth.”

The statutory warning line, “Smoking causes throat cancer”, too is to be replaced with “Smoking causes painful death” and “Tobacco causes cancer.”

A Bench of Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra, Justice AM Khanwilkar and Justice DY Chandrachud refused to entertain the tobacco companies’ plea. “It only talks about change of photos and actual images of cancer patients would be shown. What is the harm?” the Bench commented.

On behalf of the tobacco companies, senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi urged the Bench to stay the notification contending that there had to be some freedom of choice; otherwise this kind of business should be closed.

“Tomorrow if I want to drink and eat chocolate, I should be allowed to do so. If this cannot be allowed then lets close all the business. Why not make it mandatory for chocolate companies to carry a warning that chocolates lead to diabetes,” Rohatgi said.

But the Bench refused to stay the notification, saying right to freedom was subject to reasonable restrictions and choice had to be an informed choice.