Shah Rukh served legal notice for smoking in public in cricket match

Panaji, Oct 26 (UNI) Noted Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan was today served a legal notice for smoking in public place during the recent Twenty20 cricket match at Mumbai held between Australia and India.

The notice issued on behalf of the National Organisation for Tobacco Eradication (NOTE-India), threatened to launch criminal proceedings against the actor if failed to explain within a fortnight for violating the provisions of the Cigarettes and other Tobacco Products Act, 2003.

Disclosing this to mediapersons after distributing copies of the legal notice, NOTE India General Secretary Dr Shekhar Salkar said that Khan smoking in public amounted to promoting tobacco consumption with a deleterious impact on the general public and his fans.

He questioned Khan whether the latter would like to smoke in a similar manner in presence of his beloved children and kin. This act of Khan is not only illegal but grossly indecent and unethical and a national celebrity cannot display such reckless tendencies in public, he said.

Dr Salkar had also recalled the legal notice he had served on the Big B, Amitabh Bachchan for campaigning to promote a tobacco product.

''A superstar, initiated and adored by millions cannot lend a helping hand to the spread of the addiction which had been contributing to 40 per cent of the new cancer cases in the country among the youth,'' he added.

In this connection, Dr Salkar said his organisation had today released a film ''No Smoking'' directed by Anurag Kashyap and John Abraham depicting the hazards of smoking which had been afflicting 10,00,000 Indians with respiratory and cardiac disorders besides cancer every year.

UNI