India has the second largest smoking population in the world, home to more than 108 million smokers. Smoking is at once taboo and pervasive, and it’s not limited to cigarettes: Indians smoke hookahs, beedis (flavoured, unprocessed tobacco cigarettes), and weed. Some people use opium, hash or cheroot. There’s also a prevalent gutka (chewing tobacco) and betel leaf chewing habit that leaves telltale signs on people’s teeth. So it’s no surprise that vaping, less harmful than most of these habits, is gaining in popularity.
Two years ago a small crockery shop in Mohali, a city in India’s northern state of Punjab was raided by a drug inspector. Near the window of the store he found a single vape and eight cartridges, or refills for nicotine. In April of this year the state of Punjab arrested and convicted the shop’s owner, Parvesh Kumar, for allegedly selling and using vapes.
Kumar, 25, was the breadwinner of his middle class family. He spent two years worrying about his fate after the raid as his court case languished in the Indian justice system. Then this spring he was convicted and sentenced to three years in prison, with an additional fine of 100,000 rupees (about £1,147) for selling the vape and cartridges.
But Kumar’s attorney, Navin Behl,. Argued the fact there were no grounds for his client’s arrest and that Kumar was trying to quit his smoking habit with the vape, not sell the single piece he had in his cookware shop.
“There is absolutely no definition or mention of vapes or electronic cigarettes under any Indian penal code, amendment or law,” he said. “The [state] Drug Controller has clearly exceeded their juridical powers in conducting the raid because e-cigarettes [for personal use] are not banned in India yet.” Behl also argued that Kumar’s neighbours, who had ties to the police, had set up Kumar because of a personal argument between shopkeepers.
Because of the inconclusive evidence, Kumar was granted an appeal almost immediately after his conviction. So currently he is out on bail until the High Court reviews his case.
He declined an interview with Motherboard, due to the stress and trauma over his pending case.
Like a lot of countries, India has yet to solidify its laws on vaping. A handful of states, including Punjab, currently ban the import, distribution and sale of electronic nicotine devices. And in 2013 the state drugs controller listed e-cigarettes and vaporisers as “unapproved drugs”. But the private consumption of vaping itself is not defined under any law in India. So the relatively small, but growing, community of vapers in the country is operating mostly through online purchases.
India has a shocking history when it comes to drug and alcohol laws, some of which have actually worked against the country. Alcohol is banned in four states, giving rise to an underground market for moonshine. And the country’s decision to crack down on opium ended up damaging the medical system by starving he ill and chronically ill patients of painkillers such as morphine.
Vaping advocates are concerned that Kumar’s arrest would build on those laws and set a new precedent. “The arrest has threatened my business, but as I pay all custom duties, taxes legitimately and have my certifications as the official re-seller of premium e-juices and original equipment and sell only in states that have not banned it yet, I am not worried,” said Angad Kandhari, the CEO of Dampf Company, an online vendor of vapes and other similar products.
Meanwhile, state government officials are still celebrating the arrest, because they want to reclaim their control of Punjab’s drugs situations, those being heroin problem, and opioid addiction which the health department has been trying to combat with persistent public health messaging and strict regulations. Punjab state won the World Health Organisation’s World No Tobacco Day award for banning the sale of loose cigarettes, loose tobacco and chewing tobacco in 2015.
“Punjab, with this conviction, has shown the way to the entire country to end the nicotine-delivery devices sold in the form of e-cigarettes,” said Vini Mahajan, principal health secretary of the state’s Family Welfare Department, in a statement.