Among the many firsts, India became one of the first countries to completely ban vaping or the use of e-cigarettes. Three weeks ago, Union minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced that the production, distribution, sale, importing, exporting and transporting of e-cigarettes is now banned in India to prevent it from becoming an ‘epidemic’ among the youth. This announcement came just before the US-based e-cigarette firm Juul Labs Inc and Phillip Moris International wanted to sell their products in India. The government cited the reason that the number of e-cigarette smokers has increased by 6 times in the last 8 years and that smoking e-cigarettes is harmful to health.
However, an important question that people are asking now is how does the government justify the banning of e-cigarettes while there has been no ban on the use of tobacco products, which are in fact more harmful than e-cigarettes. It is interesting to understand how there are different segments of people, both for and against, the vaping ban. One segment of people are calling it a move by the government under the pressure of the powerful tobacco lobby, who feel threatened as more and more smokers switch to e-cigarettes. There is another segment, who are for the ban, are of the opinion that e-cigarettes today are no more as safe as they are made out to be. The third segment of people believes that the government should ban both tobacco products as well as e-cigarettes, and make it a tobacco-free country!
Are we really moving towards a healthy tobacco-free, smoke-free India? What do you think?
