Patna: The State Health Society has directed district magistrates and municipal commissioners to ensure removal of all tobacco product-related advertisements and hoardings in their areas.

The direction came on March 27, through a notification issued by Lokesh Kumar Singh, executive director of the State Health Society, asking the authorities to remove tobacco-related hoardings, which are in violation of the Cigarette and Other Tobacco Products Act (COTPA), 2003.

The state government has already banned sale of loose cigarettes and e-cigarettes through a notification issued earlier this year.

The new directive will help curb trade in tobacco products in the state, said Deepak Mishra, executive director of the non-government organisation Socio-Economic and Educational Society.

"It is good that the Global Adult Tobacco Survey-2, whose factsheets were recently revealed, mentioned that Bihar had seen a sharp decline, from 53.5 per cent to 25.9 per cent, in tobacco consumption in the past seven years," Mishra said. "But the tobacco industry is using various means to propagate their business, by installing advertisements in every nook and corner of the state. We welcome the state government's step."

Residents hailed the directive but said the authorities should first implement earlier orders. "The state government banned sale of loose cigarettes last month but it is hardly effective," said Manish Pandey, 45, a banker. "Tobacco shops are selling loose cigarettes at will because there is no monitoring agency."

Kuldeep Bhushan, 24, said the earlier state government directive under which tobacco shops were not allowed to sell non-tobacco products like cold drinks, chips , candies among other products was also not being implemented in Patna.

Worth mentioning here is that the state government's directive on this last year was followed by a Union health ministry advisory to chief secretaries of all states under which shops authorised to sell tobacco products were not permitted to sell non-tobacco products anymore.