World No Tobacco Day: Health ministry to introduce anti-tobacco messages in schools

After increasing the size of pictorial warnings on tobacco products, the Health Ministry is in talks with the Human Resource Development Ministry to introduce messages related to ill effects of consumption of tobacco in schools.

Health Ministry officials have reportedly said that although the idea is not to bring a separate chapter in textbooks, the warnings can either be on textbook covers or in form of posters which could be distributed to schools so that they can put it up.

Union Health Minister JP Nadda had recently said that the idea behind this is to catch them young so that the children are aware of the ill effects of consumption of tobacco. Though sale of cigarettes and other tobacco products within a 100-yard radius of educational institutions is illegal, they are freely sold near tobacco the gates of many schools and colleges in several cities across the nation.