12 years ago, on 13 June 20017, WSN ed­i­tor Jag­mo­han Singh wrote an open let­ter to Am­rit­sar-based BJP leader Laxmi Kanta Chawla, who was then Health Min­is­ter, urg­ing her to make Pun­jab to­bacco smoke-free.  Since then in Pun­jab, the con­sump­tion of to­bacco-re­lated prod­ucts has seen an ex­po­nen­tial in­crease, though it is pri­mar­ily the mi­grant pop­u­la­tion which abuses it. Still, Pun­jabis are willy-nilly tak­ing to it.  While every Sikh and health or­gan­i­sa­tion is talk­ing about drug abuse, the pro­lif­er­a­tion of to­bacco out­lets is hap­pen­ing in front of our own eyes, at every street cor­ner in vil­lages, town and cities of Pun­jab. The pre­sent health min­is­ter can also take up the is­sue, will he?  Will Sikhs them­selves do some­thing or wait, till, like al­co­hol, the use of to­bacco amongst Sikhs also be­comes a con­cern?

DEAR Laxmi Kanta Chawla Ji, Na­maste rudra­manyavau­tota ish­have namah, Na­maste astu dhan­vane bahub­hya­muta te namah. I could not greet you oth­er­wise, be­cause you are a self-pro­claimed Pun­jabi-Sikh-baiter. You claim to have deep In­dian roots, about which Pun­jabis are well aware for you were the only min­is­ter in the pre­sent Badal-BJP cab­i­net to take oath in the San­skrit lan­guage.

I write to you to ap­prise you of in­ter­est­ing de­vel­op­ment to take place in neigh­bour­ing Chandi­garh, which city has yet to be­come the sole cap­i­tal of Pun­jab due to the acts of com­mis­sion and omis­sion of lead­ers like you who dis­as­so­ci­ated them­selves from their mother tongue Pun­jabi in the six­ties when Pan­jab was de­mar­cated on lin­guis­tic lines.

I know about the mag­ni­tude of your ab­hor­rence for Pun­jabis, but speak­ing for the Pun­jabis, may I say that the de­tes­ta­tion is mu­tual. Nei­ther did you budge an inch from your stand since the last four decades nor do have lovers of Pun­jabi lost any ground to you.

Com­ing to the point, if all goes all well and no­body puts a span­ner in the works, Chandi­garh is to be­come the first smoke-free city in the coun­try.  Thanks to the work of ac­tivists of the Burn­ing Brain So­ci­ety of Chandi­garh, no child, youth or adult of Chandi­garh will have to bear the dan­gers of pas­sive smok­ing.  Des­ig­nated ar­eas for smok­ing will be ear­marked and there will be a heavy penalty im­posed on peo­ple smok­ing in non-des­ig­nated ar­eas.

 

Ten years ago, when my friend and an­thro­pol­o­gist, Fred Haer­ing came from Alaska, he said, “you know Jag­mo­han, what I like most about Pun­jab is that is a smoke-free coun­try.” I wish I could say that to­day. The Pun­jab of the nineties did not have a sin­gle road­side shop sell­ing to­bacco and to­bacco-re­lated prod­ucts.  To­day, all streets, main and by­lanes, are lit­er­ally lit­tered with such shops sell­ing death-caus­ing sub­stances to un­sus­pect­ing youth and chil­dren.  Dis­trict head­quar­ters are swarmed with such shops and out­lets. There is no vil­lage which does not have more than one such out­let.

The state of Pun­jab has thrown out the pro­vi­sions of the Anti-To­bacco act up in smoke.  No pro­vi­sion of the act has been im­ple­mented.  As the health min­is­ter of the state, I have not read about any step be­ing taken by your gov­ern­ment to im­ple­ment the rules and reg­u­la­tions un­der the Cig­a­rette and other To­bacco Prod­ucts (Pro­hi­bi­tion of Ad­ver­tise­ment and Reg­u­la­tion of Trade and Com­merce, Pro­duc­tion, Sup­ply and Dis­tri­b­u­tion) Act. 2003.

Dr Deepin­der Singh of Aas Ki­ran De-ad­dic­tion Cen­tre, Lud­hi­ana has pointed out on this World No-To­bacco Day that ac­cord­ing to a re­search done by them in as­so­ci­a­tion with Pun­jab Agri­cul­tural Uni­ver­sity, three years ago, as many as 66 per cent school go­ing chil­dren were found to be con­sum­ing to­bacco prod­ucts like flavoured pan-masala. To­bacco abuse is on the rise in Pun­jab and the ad­min­is­tra­tion is not un­aware.  Ac­cord­ing to PGI ex­pert, Dr Neeraj, to­bacco abuse was spread­ing amongst all sec­tions of so­ci­ety, rich and poor, rural and ur­ban.

I am sure that you are aware of the deaths caused by to­bacco and to­bacco-re­lated prod­ucts.  It has been con­clu­sively held that To­bacco is the sec­ond ma­jor cause of death in the world. It is cur­rently re­spon­si­ble for the death of one in ten adults world­wide (about 5 mil­lion deaths each year). If cur­rent smok­ing pat­terns con­tinue, it will cause some 10 mil­lion deaths each year by 2020.

I pray that for a change you should take up the cause of health of Pan­jabis, even if you know that the Sikhs are go­ing to ben­e­fit out of it.  On two early oc­ca­sions, you have failed the peo­ple of Pan­jab.  A brave and straight­for­ward woman leader like you for­sook Pun­jabi for an alien lan­guage.  In­stead of be­friend­ing the brave Sikh youth chal­leng­ing the might of the In­dian state and suf­fer­ing tor­ture and hu­mil­i­a­tion, you went ahead and tied Rakhi on the hands of KPS Gill.

Per­haps this is your chance to show that af­ter all you still have a wom­an’s heart.  I am hop­ing against hope.  I urge you to undo your im­age.  The en­tire pop­u­la­tion of Pun­jab, which is fast turn­ing non-Pun­jabi, will ben­e­fit if you em­u­late Chandi­garh and de­clare Pun­jab also to be a smoke-free re­gion.  Pos­ter­ity will re­mem­ber you for this and for­get what you did ear­lier.

Na­maste.

Jag­mo­han Singh