Iconic Figures Have Special Rights To Smoke On Screen

SMOKING IS INJURIOUS TO HEALTH or so we thought… isn’t it? Intelligent people (Health Ministry) who made general public believe that showing stars smoking on screen is one of the primary reasons influencing general public in to smoking… suddenly finds exception to ICONIC FIGURES. So, British statesman Winston Churchill and fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, who cannot be imagined without their cigars and pipes, can now be shown smoking in new films… though with a warning.

And being a guy with an abysmal IQ… I always thought that smoking was a centuries old practice… and motion picture is at best a century and a half old. These politicians are pathetic rulers that cannot formulate a policy that makes common sense.

A senior health ministry official said…

Characters like Churchill and Sherlock Holmes can smoke on screen. People know about them and their on-screen smoking won’t influence the audience behaviour much. This will be made public next month. If the scripts cannot do away with such a character, then the producer needs to write on the screen that smoking is injurious to health. The movies must carry a disclaimer and warning message in the beginning and end of the film. After the smoking ban in public places, the ministry wants to curb on-screen smoking but with less fuss. The film fraternity is worried about creative freedom. But what about social responsibility?

The health ministry had banned smoking in films but director Mahesh Bhatt moved court against the government decision. The case has been pending in the Delhi High Court for the last two years. The Delhi High Court is going to hear the case in the third week of November. Earlier, the ministry was completely against any smoking scenes in any movie. It had said all old movies with such scenes would have to be accompanied with a note saying the habit is injurious to health, and new films with such depictions could not be made at all. But now it has made a concession. The ministry authorities said if it was essential to show a character smoking, the producer would have to follow rules. Health Minister Anbumani Ramadoss has been reiterating that onscreen smoking is accountable for over 60 per cent new smokers (Hypocrites do come up with such phony and unsubstantiated data…). He has appealed to actors like Shah Rukh Khan and Amitabh Bachchan not to smoke in films.

Government estimates say though the tobacco industry brings a revenue of Rs 270 billion to the country every year, the treatment cost of the disease burden is at least Rs 300 billion. So, why don’t these hypocrite politicians ban smoking altogether and quit these unbaked circus feats?