'Beedi baron can't be on tobacco panel'

The Congress, the Samajwadi Party and the CPI(M) on Thursday termed as “grossly unethical” the inclusion of Beedi baron and BJP MP Shyam Charan Gupta as a member of Parliamentary Committee of Subordinate legislation — looking into the rules regarding tobacco sale in the country.

Alleging a “conflict of interest”, Congress spokesperson Sanjay Jha said, “Here you have an elected MP, who sits on a panel and clearly does not make disclosures. If he is running a `250-crore worth of business (beedi)... The conflict of interest is culpable.”

Jha further said, “You do not have to be a genius or a Sherlock Holmes to find out that what is the vested interest that he is definitely trying to pursue at the legislative level. This is the kind of risk that as a country we are getting exposed to on account of a very unethical Parliamentarian.”

Gupta had reportedly told the committee that beedis have “nil” harmful effect and had also suggested that the government should make a distinction between smoked and chewed tobacco as he believes that the former was not as harmful.

“I can produce a lot of people in front of you who are chain smokers of beedi and till date they have had no disease, no cancer... You get diabetes due to eating sugar, rice, potatoes. Why don’t you write warnings for all these things as well,” Gupta, a lok Sabha MP from Allahabad and the head of the Rs 350-crore Shyam Group, had said. His Shyam Bidi Works is one of the largest beedi manufacturers in India.

Significantly, Gupta’s remarks came barely days after the panel head BJP MP Dilip Gandhi stoked controversy saying there was no Indian study to confirm that tobacco use leads to cancer. 

SP leader Gaurav Bhatia slammed the presence of Gupta in the panel saying, “It is completely unacceptable and shocking. An MP is in a committee where he has his own vested interest. It is a clear cut case of conflict of interest.”

He said, the Speaker should step in and ensure that there should be a new Parliamentary Committee on it and if any recommendations have been accepted earlier, they should be immediately scrapped. CPI(M) leader Md Salim said that parliamentary procedures demand that such persons should be kept out of these committees and if anybody has any conflict of interest, he or she should declare it.