The ban on gutkha/pan masala and the ongoing investigation into payoffs involving a State Minister and top officials seem to have had little effect in curbing the sale of tobacco-based chewable product in the city.
Despite a ban on the manufacture, storage, transportation and sale of gutkha/panasala, these products are freely available across the city. While the sale used to be in a hush-hush manner before with shopkeepers handing gutkha packets only to regular or ‘known’ customers, now it is being done openly. With sales returning a handsome 200 % profit, shopkeepers admit that buyers apparently have no qualms paying more to get a few packets. The contraband is being smuggled into the State mainly via trains, some shopkeepers say.
While the Madras High Court wondered why the ‘gutkha scam’ should not be transferred to the Central Bureau of Investigation couple of days ago, The Hindu confirmed the availability of these products in at least 10 shops (and bought the products from few of them) situated near establishments which record high footfalls such as malls and cinema theatres and in residential areas. When the police cracked down on petty shops a few months ago, shopkeepers were reluctant to sell the banned products to unknown customers. However, shopkeepers now show no such reluctance as they stock and sell gutkha products without any inhibition. “A few months ago, the police would slap cases under Goondas Act on us and we were harassed. Now, we don’t face such problems. So we have started selling,” said a shopkeeper on Mount Road.
The shopkeeper added that since the supply is steady, even the prices have come down.
No serious seizures
Except for some token seizures, no serious measures seem to have been taken to eliminate the abundant availability of gutkha/pan masala in the city. A number of agencies, including the Chennai Police, the Chennai Corporation and the Food Safety Department among others, can enforce the ban by conducting raids on shops or suspicious godowns.
An official from the Food Safety Department said that Red Hills continues to be a major distribution hub for tobacco products in Chennai. “If we can stop it there, we can stop around 80% of the stock from being distributed. Much of the stock comes from Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka,” said the official. “Even if we raid a godown and sieze gutkha products worth ₹ 1 crore, it doesn’t even make a dent. They merely increase the price on the next consignment to make up for the loss,” said the official.
