Will resume cigarette production only after govt order: ITC

Diversified business group ITC Ltd today said it will resume production of cigarettes only after receiving a formal government notification on what pictorial warning should be printed on packs.

The company, its rival Godfrey Phillips India and others, had stopped production of cigarettes since the beginning of the month due to uncertainty over what pictorial warning should be printed.

"I have no idea, as soon as the notification comes...We are trying to manufacture as early as possible," ITC Limited Chairman Y C Deveshwar told reporters here when asked will the company will resume cigarette production.

The Cabinet had on Tuesday decided to retain the existing pictorial warnings on cigarette and bidi packages for one more year.

It was decided that the current pictorial warnings would be retained for one more year, after which it will be reviewed in December 2011.

The existing pictorial warnings - a scorpion on bidi packs and a cancer-affected lung on cigarette packs - were to be replaced by a cancer-affected mouth, from December 1 after a notification by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in May this year.

Speaking on the sidelines of an event organised by the company, Deveshwar said the company has enough stocks at present but could start facing shortage if the current production shutdown continued for a longer period.

"I hope not... It depends on how long it is closed, if is closed for a long time, it will affect," he said, when asked if its sales are impacted because of the shut down.

Cigarette business accounted for about 50 per cent of the company's overall annual turnover of over Rs 18,150 crore in the last fiscal.