Govt proposes to ban Zarda, Khaini
After banning gutka, the government now proposes to prohibit zarda and khaini — the two most consumed chewing forms of smokeless tobacco.
In a recent letter to the states, the  Union health ministry has urged them to ban zarda and khaini too. According to health ministry officials, so far only Manipur has been forthcoming and decided to put a ban on zarda and khaini.
“We are hopeful that slowly and steady the states will also follow the suit as it happened in case of gutka ban,” a senior official in the health ministry said.
The official said that the ban on zarda and khaini does not require any amendment in the Act and has been done under the existing law.
Statistics show that nearly 0.9 million deaths occur in India every year due to tobacco-use compared to 5.5 million deaths worldwide. According to the recent Global Adult Tobacco Survey, out of the 35 per cent of adults in India that use tobacco in some form or the other, ma maximum of 21 per cent use smokeless tobacco, nine per cent smoke and five per cent smoke as well as use smokeless tobacco. As per the survey about 3.82 crore people consume gutka in the country. “Chewing tobacco has high addiction rate among young people from poor sections as they are cheaper than cigarettes,” added the official. The Centre recommended the states to impose a ban on gutka in 2011, following new rules of the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India, an autonomous body under the health ministry, which ruled that “anything that is food and contains nicotine or tobacco must be banned”.
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