Delhi High Court has set aside

New Delhi. The Delhi High Court has set aside the ban imposed by the Commissioner of Food Safety on the manufacture, storage and sale of gutkha, pan masala, flavored tobacco and similar products in the city, taking into account the ‘direct and harmful effects’ of smokeless tobacco on public health. Confirmed on Monday.

A bench comprising Chief Justice Satish Chandra Sharma and Justice Yashwant Verma set aside the decision of a single judge of the high court, which had quashed the ban, while allowing the appeal filed by the Center and the Delhi government against the September 2022 order .

The court said that there is ‘no justification’ for quashing the notifications and dismissed the objections raised by the tobacco industry units against the preventive notifications issued from 2015 to 2021.

The bench said, “We find ourselves unable to uphold the impugned judgment delivered by the learned Judge. These appeals are accepted. We find no merit in the challenge raised in W.P.(C) No. 3362/2015 (against the ban). It is rejected.