Public Health on Top

BATB's 'Battle of Minds' must be put to an end. A number of departments and faculties of different public and private universities are getting instigated by BATB only to exploit the innocent minds of students to expand the tobacco business of the company. University Grant Commission (UGC) can come up and ban the 'Battle of Minds' events at all universities across the country on the moral and legal ground. The interference and influence of BATB is not limited to university campuses. The company also arranged a workshop with the Prime Minister's Office. The company managed to make a gathering of a huge number of high level govt. officials in the workshop which was arranged to give Battle of Minds participants idea about Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) tracker developed by Access to Information (a2i) in order to track SDGs implementation. The PM has declared the country to become tobacco-free by 2040. As a result, BATB will undoubtedly attempt to influence the PM's Office under the pretext of Battle of Minds or others. Arranging such workshops and programs creates opportunity for tobacco companies to come in touch with the govt. and policymakers and establish unnecessary interaction and relations only to obstruct the formulation and implementation of vital tobacco control strategies such as tobacco taxation. In order to keep the government free of tobacco industry's influence and to build a country free from the clutch of tobacco, the government must implement FCTC Article 5.3 as soon as possible.