MIKE BAXTER

The cigarette manufacturers have started an advertising blitz to induce the consumers to keep on smoking and at the same time encourage newcomers, especially the youth, to get into the smoke habit.

The foreign companies are blasting their advertisements in living color in newspapers and magazines and it seems that the US companies who have been forced by law and consumer preferences to curtail production in the States are now shifting their emphasis in these areas.

Ironically, while the "warning messages" take up a significant space in cigarette ads in US, here e.g., in a front-page color ad of a size of 200x280 mm, the warning message is only 50x3 mm which is even smaller than the name of the advertising company. Or in a 3300x5500 mm full-page ad, the message is so inconsequential, that they might just as well not put it.

Three cheers for that Commerce Ministry Babu who decided, maybe in a smoke-filled room, to allow unbridled import of cigarettes. Three cheers for the importers who are bent upon marketing ruthlessly the cancer-inducers. Three cheers for the advertising agencies that want to rake in the moolah any which way.

Sincerely:

MIKE BAXTER