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Karnataka prohibited the manufacture, storage, distribution, transportation and sale of gutkha, pan masala and other products containing tobacco or nicotine through a notification issued on 10 August 2026.
The order was issued by the Office of the Commissioner, Food Safety and Drugs Administration at Bengaluru, under Section 30(2)(a) of the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006 read with Regulation 2.3.4 of the Food Safety and Standards (Prohibition and Restrictions on Sales) Regulations, 2011.
The ban runs for one year from the date of the notification and covers packaged and unpackaged products, as well as tobacco or nicotine sold separately in a form that lets consumers mix it themselves.
Food Safety Officers have begun special inspection drives across the state, and the department has asked residents to report illegal manufacture, distribution or sale.
Such state bans rest on the principle in Regulation 2.3.4 that tobacco and nicotine may not be used as ingredients in any article of food — the route by which Madhya Pradesh became the first state to ban gutkha in March 2012.
Empowers the Commissioner of Food Safety of a state to prohibit, in the interest of public health, the manufacture, storage, distribution or sale of any article of food for a specified period. This is the provision Karnataka has invoked, and it is why such bans are typically notified for one year at a time and renewed.
Bars the use of tobacco and nicotine as ingredients in any food product. Because gutkha and pan masala are regulated as food, this regulation is the substantive basis on which states have banned them since 2012.
The principal central law on tobacco control, covering advertising bans, health warnings, prohibition of sale to minors and smoking in public places. It regulates tobacco products but does not itself ban gutkha — that comes through food safety law.
A Directive Principle of State Policy requiring the State to raise the level of nutrition and public health, and in particular to endeavour to prohibit the consumption of intoxicating drinks and of drugs injurious to health, except for medicinal purposes.
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The state-level authority under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006 responsible for enforcing food safety law, empowered by Section 30(2)(a) to prohibit an article of food in the interest of public health.
A chewing preparation typically combining tobacco, areca nut and flavouring agents, sold in small pouches.
A packaged preparation of areca nut and other ingredients, sold with or without tobacco depending on the formulation — the distinction that determines whether a ban applies to it.
The Food Safety and Standards Authority of India, the statutory regulator established under the Food Safety and Standards Act, 2006, headquartered at New Delhi under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
The Directive Principle directing the State to improve nutrition and public health and to endeavour to prohibit consumption of drinks and drugs injurious to health.