New Delhi, Apr. 14 (PTI): The Delhi government has banned for one year the sale, purchase and storage of all forms of chewable tobacco, including gutka, pan masala, khaini and zarda, in the national capital.

According to a notification issued by the Department of Food Safety on Thursday, unpackaged products of chewable tobacco, too, are banned.

”The manufacture, storage, distribution, or sale of tobacco which is either flavoured, scented or mixed... and whether going by the name or form of gutka, pan, masala, flavoured/scented tobacco, kharra, or otherwise... whether packaged or unpackaged and/or sold as one product, or though packaged as separate products, sold or distributed in such manner so as to easily facilitate mixing by the consumer” is prohibited for a period of one year, the notification stated.

Health department officials said the government had issued a notification in September 2012, in pursuance of a series of directions from Supreme Court for a ban on 'gutka' in the city.

But since the term 'gutka' was used in that notification, tobacco retailers started selling the components of 'gutka' (betel nut and raw tobacco) in separate pouches, thus defeating the purpose behind the ban on gutka.

The health department had, therefore, come up with a new proposal for banning all raw chewable tobacco products in Delhi, a senior official said.