It has booked 50 cases under COTPA from January to June this year. The cell in Gadag has booked 2,258 case in the same period.
It seems the anti-tobacco cell of the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) is on ventilator for the past few months. If the situation continues for a few more weeks, the time will come that the anti-tobacco cell will become defunct owing to lack of funds.
Speaking with dna, Dr SK Savitha, nodal officer, district anti-tobacco cell, BBMP, said the lack of funds and encouragement were the main reasons for the imminent closure of anti-tobacco cell, situated on the BBMP head office premises.
“The authorities concerned released only Rs2 lakh during the last year for the maintenance of the anti-tobacco cell and to carry out anti-tobacco programmes in the city,” she said.
The BBMP commissioner had sent a notice to Bruhat Bangalore Hotels’ Association, directing it to advise its members to put up signages at hotels, banning smoking and ensuring separate area in the hotel premises for smokers. In his letter dated July 18, the commissioner had said that failure to put up no-smoking signages at hotels would invite penalty and punishment under Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products Act (COTPA), 2003, and KMC Act, 1976.
Dr Savitha had also directed the hoteliers that direct/indirect or surrogate advertising in the form of small kiosks outside and in the vicinity of hotel premises should not be encouraged as they violate Section 5 of COTPA. However, neither awareness programme on the ill-effects of smoking was held nor inspection of hotels was done by the anti-tobacco cell officials to see whether or not the BBMP commissioner’s directive was implemented by the hoteliers.
Dr Savitha said it has become tough for her to lead the anti-tobacco cell owing to lack of funds.
“Last year, the authorities concerned promised to allocate Rs10 lakh, but sanctioned only Rs2 lakh. They told us funds would be released in April for this financial year, but not a single rupee has been released till date. As of now, the BBMP is spending Rs25,000 per month towards salary of three employees of the cell,” she said.
However, Dr P Jagannath, state consultant, Karnataka, National Tobacco Control Programme, said the efforts were being made to merge the anti-tobacco cell with National Health Rural Mission. “We are waiting for the funds from central government. We will release the funds to the BBMP anti-tobacco cell as soon as we get funds from the Central Government,” said Dr Jagannath.
The anti-tobacco cell has succeeded in booking only 50 cases under the COTPA and collected Rs17,210 as penalty between January and June 2013. While Gadag district leads the list with 2,258 cases and a penalty of Rs1.7 lakh, Belgaum is in the second place with 1,632 cases and a penalty of Rs1.6 lakh. Mysore registered only two cases and a penalty of Rs200 was collected while no cases were registered in cities such as Kolar, Tumkur, Mandya, Kodagu, Bidar, Chitradurga, Bellary, Konkan Railways, Koppal, Davangere, Chikballapur and Mangalore City.
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