PIL filed against smuggling by tobacco MNCs

PIL filed against smuggling by tobacco MNCs
SANCHITA SHARMA

NEW DELHI, DECEMBER 15: The Supreme Court today issued notices to top Indian cigarette manufacturers on a public interest litigation seeking to stop them from smuggling foreign brands of their international partners into India. The PIL was filed following two reports on cigarette smuggling into India by tobacco multinationals in The Indian Express in October.

The petition has sought damages of Rs 22,200 crore from ITC, Vazir Sultan Tobacco and Godfrey Phillips, to be deposited in a fund to be set up under the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare.

The petition, filed by Rani Jethmalani, on behalf of the NGO, Women's Action Research and Legal for Women (WARLAW), has also demanded that the Government investigate the matter, saying its ``inaction and delay'' in curbing cigarette smuggling undermined the constitutional rights to life and health and harmed public health policies and laws of the country.

Calling smuggling a ``clandestine and surreptitious act, the sole purpose of which is the maximisation of the sale of tobacco products through illegal means for corporate profits,'' the petition seeks a CBI investigation into the business practices and corporate policies of the companies.

``We felt there was an urgent need for the CBI to investigate the matter in view of the two reports that exposed the issue in The Indian Express and the fact that the tobacco companies admit to the smuggling in their internal documents now in the public domain,'' said Jethmalani. ``Cigarettes are a lethal and dangerous product and need to be regulated,'' she added.

The involvement of the tobacco multinationals in contraband trade and active smuggling emerged when the industry was forced to put up 35 million internal documents in the Minnesota and Guildford depositories following trials in the US. The documents exposed many illegal company practices, causing them to lose billions of dollars in damages.

In India, the only other case against cigarette manufacturers in the Supreme Court was filed by former MP Murli Deora last year. There are two more cases pending in Delhi High Court. The present case, however, is the first one to seek a criminal investigation.

``Though criminal action against the tobacco industry is taking place in many other parts of the world, this is the first time a criminal investigation has been sought against the tobacco industry in India,'' said Chitra Subramaniam, Head, International Relations of WHO's Tobacco Free Initiative in Geneva. Anti-smuggling protocols will form an important part of the World Health Organisation's first ever public health treaty, Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC), currently being negotiated by its 191 member countries.