India: advocates hit back at smokeless industry.

Tobacco control advocates in India who have been active for more than two decades, together with a few ageing colleagues from the west, will remember the sweat and toil of trying to kick-start a self-sustaining and viable Indian tobacco control movement in the 1980s. The switchback ride from optimism to disappointment , the new dawns and false starts, the workshop sessions shouted against noisy air conditioners, the sheer hard work, heat and dust of it all – in those days it seemed an impossible dream to reach the present situation. However, there is now a real will at federal government level, led by one of the world's most outstanding health ministers , and many skilled, experienced and well informed health advocates constantly monitoring developments and lobbying for progress. India is a very different place now, a fact recognised by its successful bid to host the next world conference on tobacco and health. Among the more visible evidence of change recently was an incident on the front line of the ongoing battle for comprehensive tobacco control legislation. Unlike most big tobacco consuming nations, India's biggest health problem comes from the much greater amounts of tobacco consumed orally, in several forms, than is smoked in cigarettes. In addition, the ubiquitous bidis, the cheap, hand-rolled, traditional smoking products , cause massive damage to the health of the poorest sections of this vast country. In the past, cigarette manufacturers have not been averse to implying in their marketing communications that Indians who suck or chew tobacco, as well as bid-smokers, should trade up to the higher ''quality'' offered by cigarettes. In the old days, advertisements portrayed cigarette smokers typically as successful, better paid and more educated members of the burgeoning new middle-class, the millions of consumers being swept along in the country's incoming tide of economic prosperity. Thus, while other countries have to contend mainly with resistance to public health progress from the big cigarette companies, India faces additional foes – the formidable smokeless tobacco and bidi industries, both, especially bidi manufacturers , armed with the political bludgeon of far higher employment numbers than the ever more capital intensive cigarette manufacturers. Predictably, therefore, the union (federal) health ministry's efforts to implement new tobacco product labelling rules are being constantly countered by a wide range of tobacco industry opposition. The arguments may be exactly the same ones familiar the world over – that it will …