.... the brain is not a vessel to be filled,
It is something to be IGNITED

BURNING BRAIN NEWSLETTER - December 2006

Last couple of months saw one of the most sly tobacco company roll out its version of corporate social responsibility. A “Blood Donation” drive clubbed with a renamed “Bravery Award” suffixing the umbrella brand name of its tobacco products. By pulling out a successful event, the tobacco company once again made the point (What is already too well known) that if you have money power in India; you can buy the politicians, the social workers, media space and everything associated. This time the company managed to use the Bollywood damsel Priety Zinta as their “Pied Piper of Hamelin.” The Union Social Welfare Minister, Ms. Miera Kumar along with the parliamentarian son of Delhi Chief Minister, Mr. Sandeep Dixit got carried away by the cancerous tunes and provided a helping hand to the tobacco company spread the dance of cancer and death under the cloak of bravery. Sandeep’s mother, Ms. Shiela Dixit (Delhi’s CM) has a long association with the tobacco companies and had appeared in the bravery award functions (Held in the name of a cigarette brand, by this company only) a few years back amid protests. When it comes to old associations and money, then; “Honey, who cares?” 

The present activity of the tobacco industry has a two pronged strategy. First; to promote their tobacco umbrella brand name “Godfrey Phillips,” and second; to lobby and bribe Parliamentarians, Ministers, government officials and others. 

In the series of their game of bribery, deceit and willful negation of parliamentary laws, the tobacco company had successfully roped in the “Finance Minister,” the “Vice President of India” and the “Defense Minister” last year. Probably all of them suffer from amnesia and do not remember their consent to the tobacco control legislation passed by the parliament and the ratification of the FCTC in 2003. Our parliamentarians are also forgetful of Section 5 of the tobacco control legislation (COTPA) which reads, (Quote)5.… no person shall take part in any advertisement which directly or indirectly suggests or promotes the use or consumption of cigarettes or any other tobacco products. ……(Section5 (3).) No person, shall, under a contract or otherwise promote or agree to promote the use or consumption of—  (b) any trade mark or brand name of cigarettes or any other tobacco product in exchange for a sponsorship, gift, prize or scholarship given or agreed to be given by another person. ..(Section 22.) Whoever contravenes the provision of section 5 shall, on conviction, be punishable— (a) in the case of first conviction, with imprisonment for a term which may extend to two years …(b) in the case of second or subsequent conviction with imprisonment for a term which may extend to five years and with fine.. (Unquote).

Our parliamentarians seem to have even forgotten the “Preamble” of the legally binding international treaty, the FCTC, which they ratified and which forewarns the governments in the following words; (Quote)… the need to be alert to any efforts by the tobacco industry to undermine or subvert tobacco control efforts and the need to be informed of activities of the tobacco industry that have a negative impact on tobacco control efforts, (Unquote). The saddest part is that the likes of the Union Minister for Social Welfare (Daughter of an Ex-Defence Minister), A Social Worker and a Member of Parliament (Son of the Delhi Chief Minister), the Defence Minister, Finance Minister and even the Vice President of India are playing in the hand of the tobacco industry and trying to cover their misdeeds under the cloak of a calling it a genuine social activity.  

Do they think that words like “Godfrey Phillips,” “John Player,” “Marlboro,” “Wills,” and “ITC” are in the open public domain and not registered trade marks/brands referring to tobacco products? If they do think so, then they certainly have a duty to educate the one billion populations too because the whole nation thinks otherwise. 

Shouldn’t they ask from their own conscience some simple questions? Are they really doing a public service by participating in an activity sponsored in the name of tobacco brand and solely by tobacco money? Why is the tobacco company spending over 150 million rupees of corporate money every year to promote bravery and blood donation in the name of their corporate and tobacco identity? Why are all the activities in the name of the brand identity? Why advertising agencies have been roped in to strategically position all these activities? Why their governments are doling concession to these tobacco companies despite it being against the law? Why are they not enforcing the tobacco control legislation and not taking legal action against these companies (Which invite them and pay them money) for violating the tobacco control laws? Why the smoke-free laws do not see the light of the day in their governments? Who is responsible for nearly one million tobacco induced deaths every year in India? And a few more “Why’s” on the same lines.  

I am sure, right from the first question, they know the answer and that they are fully aware of this conscious accomplice role, along-side the tobacco industry, to kill their own country-men for their minor share of the deadly tobacco money. 

Yours,
Hemant Goswami
Chairperson,
Burning Brain Society

JOIN THE COALITION AGAINST TOBACCO

With nearly one million preventable deaths caused by tobacco in India annually, tobacco has become one of the biggest public health problem. It is estimated that despite all the tobacco control efforts, nearly one billion lives would  still be lost worldwide due to tobacco use this centaury.

Tackling tobacco and the commercial interests behind it warrants a unified initiative from the civil society. A comprehensive approach, uncompromising activism and a loud unified voice is the need of the hour. People from all walks of life are required to participate and work to put an end to this poisonous drug.

This national coalition of NGO's/Trusts/Organizations/ Group of people has been formed to strengthen the movement to prevent millions of lives lost to tobacco. The coalition is not limited to NGO's working in public health but includes NGO's and Civil Society groups working on Civil Rights, Human Rights, Legal Initiatives, Consumer Empowerment, Public Safety, Child Abuse, Women Rights, Farmers Rights, Agriculture, Social improvement and  all other allied areas with an objective to save lives and improve quality of life.

Amongst others, the coalition has been formed with the following main objectives;

Immediate short term objectives:

Long term objectives:

You are invited to become a part of the coalition. There is no membership fee/joining fee for the first NGO/organization joining the coalition from each district of India, which means over 604 organizations from 35 States/UT gets free membership of the coalition.

"Public Services Bill." An eye-wash or some hope?

What do you think of the initiative to bring in a Public Services Act? Read the draft public service bill. It appears to ask the moon from the bureaucracy (I am talking about their point of view) and the government servants; though very basic, but still something which the government officials have forgotten over the years. To begin with, the bill mentions about the values of public services in the following words;

3.1             The Public Service and the Public Servants  shall be guided and informed by the following values in the discharge of their functions:

(a)               allegiance to the Constitution and the law, democracy, nationalism, sovereignty, integrity of India and the  security of the nation;

(b)               function in an  apolitical manner regardless of the political party in power; keeping the interests of the nation in mind;

(c)               function with the objective that Public Service and Public Servants are to serve as  instruments of good governance and to provide services for the betterment of the public at large and foster socio-economic development;

(d)               act objectively, impartially, honestly, equitably, diligently  and in a fair and just manner;

(e)               act with integrity and in a courteous and transparent manner;

(f)                 establish high standards, and ensure quality service, effective working and prompt decision making;

(g)               be accountable for the decisions and the decision making process in the discharge of functions;

(h)              enable effective management, professional growth and leadership development in  Public Services;

(i)                 uphold the highest ethical standards;

(j)                 establish merit as the fundamental principle in employment, promotion and placements;

(k)               recognize that the Public Service and Public Servants are required to discharge the functions with due regard to the diversity of the Indian nation/community and religion but without  discrimination of caste, community, religion, gender or class and duly protecting the interest of poor, underprivileged and weaker sections;

(l)                 conduct themselves in a manner such as to promote the principles underlying the Constitution of India while providing honest, impartial and frank advice to political executive in the discharge of their functions;

(m)            recognize that misuse of official position or information amounts to violation of the trust reposed in the public servant; 

(n)              ensure that public moneys are used with the utmost economy and care;

(o)               ensure that the Public Service provides a workplace that is free from discrimination and that recognizes and utilizes the diversity of the Indian community it serves;

(p)               ensure that the Public Service establishes workplace relations that value communication, consultation, cooperation and input from employees on matters that affect their workplace; and

(q)               ensure that the Public Service provides a reasonable opportunity to all eligible members of the community to apply for Public Service employment. 

 The proposed bill prescribes the following penalties to be imposed on defaulting employees;

[Proposed Section 6] Breaches of the Public Service Code

(1)       The Head of a Department or Institution may, subject to the provisions of the Constitution and this Act, impose the following sanctions on a Public Service employee in the Department who is found (under procedures established under the Constitution and this Act) to have breached the Public Service Code:

(a)  termination of employment;

 (b)  reduction in classification;

(c)  re-assignment of duties;

(d)  reduction in salary;

(e)  deductions from salary, by way of fine;

(f)  a reprimand.

The proposed bill contains many good initiatives but its not without the usual trade-mark of deliberate bureaucratic loop-holes and the age-old (colonial) weapon of discretion . The Public Services Act will also add one more "Public Service Authority" to the already too long list of "Official toothless bodies." As usual the functioning of this body shall also be recommendatory (Powerless and another post-retirement rehabilitation body) and all the power and the real authority remains in the hands of the ruling government alias the bureaucracy and politicians at the higher level. And as expected there are no firm provisions to deal with the officers coming from the services, which means that most of the IAS, etc. can continue to be arrogant, subjective and  defiant. Is it going to be one more tool of control in the hand of bureaucracy and the politicians or is it a ray of hope for the common many. Judge for yourself. Read the draft "Public Services Bill."

Another U-Turn by MoH
Mysterious circumstances: Graphic warnings on tobacco packages likely to be delayed

It has become a routine with the "Ministry of Health & family Welfare." First; announce an initiative amid a lot of noise and fanfare and then; forget about it; if possible keep it delaying for time immemorial. When initiatives are announced, they are given wide media coverage, and when they are diluted and/or buried under the stacks of time, it's hidden from the public. The ever gullible public thinks that their government has done something wonderful. Mysterious forces seem to work on all seemingly good tobacco related initiatives and they somehow gets diluted and/or scraped. This happened with the "Tobacco in movies law" (One of the basis on which the Government of India won the Luther Terry award) and now it's happening with the uniform "Graphic Display Warnings" on all tobacco packages.

Once again it has been proved that the tobacco lobby has a better control of the Indian Health Ministry (Like in many others places across the world) than the public health organizations. In an unfortunate development, the rules which made it mandatory to carry pictorial warnings covering 50% of the tobacco product packages have been postponed for unknown reasons. Will this also follow the same fate as of the much talked about “Movie Rules” announced on May 31 2005, needs to be seen. The (Movie & tobacco) rules announced in 2005 have been postponed a record 11 times and even when the notification of 20th October 2006 notifies the rules once again, it fails to mention the date from which these rules will apply, making the rules nothing more than poor quality toilet paper (As some of our frustrated volunteers say).

Without questioning, this all satisfies the tobacco industry. It may be noted that while the tobacco industry can have the entire health ministry on its knees in a single day just by addressing a representation to the health ministry (MoH), the public health workers and organizations have to work for years to get even the most basic relief. Tobacco industry representatives can just walk through the doors of the officials of the MoH but representatives of NGO’s have to wait for hours outside the door of the officials before they can get a couple of minutes of audience. MoH people are often too busy to meet the public health workers (Who are doing the job which MoH officials are supposed to do) but always available for the tobacco industry representatives.

It may be mentioned that the Indian pictorial health warning rules were not adopted as a matter of routine by the Indian government; concerned citizens had to file a writ petition in the High Court for implementation of the provisions of pictorial warnings. The case went on for two years before the Indian Government (Ministry of Health) gave an undertaking (Along with a copy of the notification) to the court stating that the new rules on pictorial warning will come into effect from Feb. 1, 2007. On the previous hearing (Preceding the decision) the High Court judge was very agitated by the fact that the Ministry of Health was delaying the rules and had specifically asked the representative of the government in the open court, “What is the tobacco industry giving you to delay the notification?”

The recent decision of the Ministry of Health to postpone the pictorial warning rules and further consider some more representation by the tobacco industry is just not incorrect but also a fit case of misleading the High Court and a case for contempt of court (Since the MoH had supplied a copy of the rules to the High Court along with an undertaking on the basis of which the writ petition was decided).

We registered our protest and wrote to the Health Ministry (The minister and all concerned officials) and reasoned for not delaying the graphic warning rules any further. Once again, we didn't even receive an acknowledgement whereas when the tobacco industry wrote (Protesting about the rules) to the MoH, they were called for a (secret) "High tea" and subsequently the law was postponed.

Read the letter we wrote to the MoH and the PM.

Dr Anbumani Ramadoss
Minister of Health & Family Welfare
Ministry of Health & Family Welfare
Room No. 345, A "Wing"
Nirman Bhawan, Maulana Azad Road
New Delhi-110011

Dear Dr. Ramadoss,

From your recent statements which appeared in a few national newspapers and also from the information the undersigned has from the Ministry of Health, we understand that Government of India’s Ministry of Health is considering postponing the implementation of the gazette notification number G.S.R. 402(E) dated July 5, 2006 relating to graphic warnings on tobacco packages.

We would like to mention that any proposal to further delay implementation of rules relating to graphic warnings on tobacco packages shall be very unfortunate as the civil society has not only fought the hard battle on this issue at various forums but concerned citizens also had to go to the "Himachal Pradesh High Court" by way of a "Public Interest Civil Writ Petition" to get the pictorial warnings rules as prescribed in the "Cigarette and Other Tobacco Products Act 2003" notified.

We have come to know that the decision to delay the notification has been taken because some tobacco companies have written a few letters to MoH and have put in some pressure through certain influential people. This is quite unfortunate and we protest to this kind of special favour accorded to the tobacco industry. In the last 3 years (Since the new tobacco control legislation came into force) we have given scores of representations to the MoH but still we have never been called for a meeting on the basis of our representation and have never ever received reply to even a single letter/representation. However the tobacco companies and their allies mysteriously get result for every letter they write and also get red-carpet invitation. Their representatives get VIP treatment in MoH whereas no one seems to have any time for the representatives of the civil society working on tobacco control. Such disparity is quite painful and the undersigned is pointing this out on behalf of a large section of civil society representatives who are experiencing and closely watching all this.

It may be pointed out that any decision to delay or amend the notification number G.S.R. 402(E) dated July 5, 2006 also has huge legal ramifications at both national and international level. We are pointing out two of such issues hereunder.

India signed the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) on 10th Sep 2003 and ratified the treaty on 5th Feb 2004. The graphic warnings as prescribed under the Indian legislation and the rules made there-under relates to Article 11 of FCTC commitment on the issue of "Packaging and labelling of tobacco products." According to Article 11 of the FCTC, each party is legally bound to adopt and implement the provisions of Article 11 within a period of three years after entry into force of FCTC for that party. For India this period of three years expires on February 4, 2007.

If the "Cigarettes and other Tobacco Products (Packaging and Labelling) Rules 2006" are delayed beyond the originally prescribed date of February 1, 2007 then it shall be a clear violation of the FCTC.

It may be recalled that the graphic warning notification came into effect after concerned citizens filed a "Public Interest Civil Writ Petition" in the "Himachal Pradesh High Court." The court was quite displeased because of the delaying tactics of the MoH on the warning issues and on two occasions even passed harsh remarks on the functioning of the MoH and its officials. Subsequently even the Secretary of Health was directed to appear in person. However the MoH represented by the Assistant and Under Secretary presented the July 5th notification in the High Court and gave an undertaking that in accordance with the relief desired in the petition, they have implemented the provisions of the legislation relating to the pictorial warning which shall come into effect from February 1, 2007.

Now, if the notification is further delayed, it will clearly amount to misleading the High Court by submitting false statements in the court of law with the intention to defeat the process of law. It also amount to contempt of the court. We understand that the concerned citizens will not hesitate to approach the court again for appropriate relief and for investigation of the fact that how come a notification which came three years too late and gave a long lead time of over seven months to the tobacco industry to implement the provisions related to pictorial warning, is to be delayed yet again on flimsy grounds.

How violation of the provisions of the FCTC and issues related to all this will reflect for a country which won the "Luther Terry Award" at the 2006 World conference on tobacco is also to be considered by your good self.

We hope that you will once again reconsider the "Ministry of Health" decision to postpone the implementation of gazette notification number G.S.R. 402(E) dated July 5, 2006 in the light of the above mentioned contentions. We further hope that you will give one more good reason to the Indian public to celebrate the Christmas and New Year by reassuring them that the tobacco industry has been given enough time and that they wouldn’t be allowed any further dupe beyond the February 1, 2006 deadline.

Wishing you a happy Christmas and a very happy new year;

Yours cordially

Hemant Goswami
Chairperson, Burning Brain Society
 

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