Youth appeal to PM: Hike tobacco tax

NT Correspondent

Bengaluru: Tobacco causes irreparable damage to young lives and it is now well established that most adult users of tobacco get addicted to it in childhood or adolescence.

Realising how important it is to stop the habit as early as possible, over 500 youth and representatives of youth associations have urged the Prime Minister and Finance Minister to increase taxes on all tobacco products in the upcoming budget for 2022- 23. The call resonated with National Youth Day on Wednesday which has the theme ‘Saksham Yuva, Sashakth Yuva’ (Capable Youth, Strong Youth).

The team have appealed to Mr Modi & Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman to increase the excise duty on cigarettes, bidis and smokeless tobacco and enable a healthy and addiction-free ecosystem for young people of the country.

According to the youth groups, increasing excise on tobacco products can be a very effective measure to also raise revenue for the central government. It will be a win-win proposition for generating revenue and reducing tobacco use and related diseases as well as COVID related comorbidities.

Some of the major recommendations to the Prime Minister and the Finance Minister include significantly increasing the existing tax burden so that tobacco products become unaffordable to the vulnerable (especially youth) and reduce the economic burden they impose, minimizing the discrepancies in taxation across different tobacco products and simplifying the tobacco tax structure by reducing the number of tax tiers and implementing stronger packing rules. They also recommend that the revenue generated by the tax hike be used to shift tobacco farmers to other crops, provide an alternate livelihood to bidi rollers, tobacco vendors and others who might be affected by the tax hike.

Pointing out that youngsters are vulnerable to tobacco promotions in the form of surrogate advertisements Roshan, a 10th standard student from St Joseph’s Boys’ High School, Bengaluru said “Our movie stars pose with cigarettes creating an impression that it is cool to be a smoker. Our innocent minds fail to recognize the trap and many of us fall prey and end up becoming addicted to tobacco. I urge the Prime Minister and Finance Minister to hike tax on tobacco so that youngsters will no longer be able to afford them.”

Increasing taxes means a winwin- win for the state as it increases revenue; reduces consumption, saves lives and also reduces the state burden of treatment costs. It is a globally accepted strategy that by tripling taxes, revenue can be doubled, and consumption can be halved. When tobacco prices go up, smoking and other tobacco use go down, especially among vulnerable groups such as youth, pregnant women and low-income smokers.

India is in the midst of the COVID- 19 third wave and it should be noted that available research indicates that tobacco use increases the risk of severe COVID-19 infection, complications, and death. Tobacco use which is a slow-moving pandemic itself, claims the lives of 13 lakh Indians each year. It is more critical than ever before to keep tobacco products out of the hands of vulnerable sections like youth and the underprivileged sections of society.

Raising taxes on tobacco products is the single most effective way to reduce tobacco use and save lives in India. Tobacco taxes remain well below rates that are commonly present in countries with effective tobacco control policies, making tobacco products very cheap and affordable. All tobacco products in India are under-taxed.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), raising the price of tobacco products through tax increases is the most effective policy to reduce tobacco use. Higher tobacco prices decrease affordability, encourage quitting among users, prevent initiation among non-users and reduce the quantity consumed. The WHO recommends that the share of excise tax for tobacco products should be increased to 75% of the retail price. Sharing her personal experience of how tobacco addiction took away her father, Preethi, a student said, “Addiction to tobacco took away my dad when I was 12 years old. I understand the pain of losing a dear one to tobacco. Tobacco should be made so unaffordable that no one loses their family or dear ones to addictions caused due to increasing accessibility to tobacco products. Increasing taxes on tobacco products will make these killer products less affordable and fetch substantial revenue for the government”.