Iindiatvnews:
New Delhi: Thursday, 28 May 2015.
Challans for
smoking and drinking alcohol are very uncommon in India. It may be because of
the loopholes while enacting and implementing a law for the concerned cause.
Delhi Police
often claims that it has issued hundreds of challans, especially on the
occasion of some festivity, for violation of the rules. But is it really
discharging its duty by merely issuing challans on a few occasions only? The
answer is clearly NO.
An RTI reply
by Delhi Police stated that in last three years, in New Delhi area of the city,
the police issued only 2 challans for smoking in public areas and 83 challans
for alcohol drinking publically.
Law
practitioner, Kush Kalara had filed an RTI with the Ministry of Health and
Family Welfare seeking information about number of challans issued for smoking
and drinking in last 3 years in the national capital. The same was forwarded by
the Ministry of Health to the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA). The MHA stated
that all state information is not maintained by it and it directed Delhi Police
to address the query.
At present,
Delhi Police functions in 14 ranges. The Delhi Police, till date, has provided
data of only two police stations (New Delhi police station and Ashok Vihar
police station) and North District.
The RTI reply
from the New Delhi police station reads: In 2012: 0 challan for smoking and 5
challan for drinking. In 2013: 2 challan for smoking and 49 challan for
drinking. In 2014: 0 challan for smoking and 27 challan for drinking. In 2015
(till March 30): 0 challan for smoking and 2 challan for drinking.
The RTI reply
from the Ashok Vihar police station: As per report of all SHOs, total numbers
of 821 challan for drinking and 3 challan for smoking were issued during the
period mentioned in the RTI application.
The RTI reply
by PIO, North District stated that 990 challans of drinking were issued during
the last three years in North District, Delhi and in respect of smoking in
public place may be treated 'Nil'.
Alcohol
consumption in India has increased by a worrying 55% over the last two decades
(between 1992 and 2012). India's per capita consumption of alcohol is the third
highest in the world after the Russian Federation and Estonia, a report by the
Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has revealed.
Another worrying trend in India is that the average age of initiation to
alcohol use has gone down from 28 years during the 1980s to 17 years in 2007.
The number of
alcohol-related deaths increased steeply in last few years. The National Crime
Records Bureau (NCRB) data also revealed the same. During the period ranging
from 2008 to 2012, this figure saw a steep rise of 27 per cent from the level
of 4308 to 5478. A massive increase of 21 per cent was alone witnessed in 2012
when death figure zoomed to 5478 as against 4547 cases registered in 2011.
According to
an estimate, there are approximately 120 million smokers in India. Also, India
is the second largest consumer (275 million tobacco users) and the third
largest producer of tobacco products in the world. The World Health
Organization (WHO) says that India is home to 12 per cent of the world's
smokers. Approximately 9,00,000 people die every year in India due to smoking
as of 2009.
.JPG)
.JPG)
