Punjab and Haryana High Court issues notice in plea to regulate sale of tobacco to minors

The Punjab and Haryana High Court recently issued notice to Central and State authorities on a plea to regulate the sale of tobacco products on online platforms to underage persons [Tejaswin Raj through his guardian/authorized representative Anshu v. Union of India & Ors]..A Bench of Acting Chief Justice GS Sandhawalia and Justice Lapita Banerji sought responses from the respondents and set the next date of hearing to July 24. On this date, the Court will consider service upon Swiggy, Blinkit Instagram and others."In the meantime, if the above factual aspect is correct, the respondents-authorities shall take appropriate steps to ensure that such articles are not readily available in the manner which has been prescribed and take steps to implement all statutory provisions," the order stated..The Court was hearing a petition filed by a 15-year-old student who sought enforcement of various health regulations which he claimed were being violated by online platforms.The teenager, represented by his guardian, approached the Court after being deeply concerned over the high use of smoking and vaping among his peer groups in Chandigarh.In his plea, he claimed that the Cigarettes and other Tobacco Products (Prohibition of Advertisement and Regulation of Trade And Commerce, Production, Supply and Distribution) Act (COTPA), 2003 and the Prohibition of Electronic Cigarettes (Production, Manufacture, Import, Export, Transport, Sale, Distribution, Storage, and Advertisement) Act, 2019 were not being implemented in letter and spirit. As a result, banned products like e-cigarettes were easily available to teenagers, he claimed..Underage persons are able to easily buy tobacco products from platforms like Swiggy Instamart and Blinkit, in violation of Section 6(a) of the COTPA, which prohibits sale of such products to children below the age of eighteen, the plea said.The petitioner also stated that he could order a pack of cigarettes through the Blinkit app simply by ticking on the box "YES, I AM ABOVE 18," and the same was delivered within 9 minutes..Apart from seeking the implementation of exisiting legislation by the authorities, the plea also prayed for the formation of a monitoring committee supervised by three retired judges of the High Court. This committee can create a permanent mechanism to prohibit the illicit trade and promotion of e-cigarettes and tobacco products to the youth, the petitioner suggested..Advocate Himanshu Raj represented the petitioner.Advocate Dheeraj Jain appeared for various Central ministries. Advocates Sanjiv Ghai, Navjit Singh and Parminder S Kaul appeared for the Chandigarh administration. Advocates Saurav Khurana and Darika Sikka appeared for various authorities of the Punjab government.Advocate Deepak Balyan represented the Haryana government authorities..Corrigendum: A previous version of this story said that notice had been issued to Swiggy and Blinkit. The error is regretted..[Read order]