Once again happy Bhutan is in the news.
When I read articles like the one linked above I always wonder,if it's the will of the people or nothing but a publicity stunt.
I can never do these sorts of articles justice but I can't stop myself from wondering if happiness and draconian measures can coexist.
I find it disheartening that in 2003 Bhutan: the world’s most advanced tobacco control nation? appeared in print in an issue of Tobacco Control.
Reading that makes it seem scary enough.
By 2003 19 out of 20 districts in Bhutan had banned the sale of tobacco.
Everyone I ever knew who smoked indoors at restaurants and bars,in stores and shopping malls,bowling alleys,roller rinks and in their cars never thought they'd be forced into the open to smoke,or forced out of their bars or pubs to light up.
Everyone I ever knew and know who smoked or still smoke can remember when this was never a possibility.
Those days are over and our enemy is the people we vote in to protect us and the doctors we trust to care for us when we are ill.
They have other accomplices in this,there can never be any doubt of that but the people we believed would protect us,would listen to us,would do what we as their constituents asked them to have done what they thought was best no matter what the opposition.
And in my head I imagine scenes like the one described here play out all over the world.......
Reading that makes it seem scary enough.
By 2003 19 out of 20 districts in Bhutan had banned the sale of tobacco.
Everyone I ever knew who smoked indoors at restaurants and bars,in stores and shopping malls,bowling alleys,roller rinks and in their cars never thought they'd be forced into the open to smoke,or forced out of their bars or pubs to light up.
Everyone I ever knew and know who smoked or still smoke can remember when this was never a possibility.
Those days are over and our enemy is the people we vote in to protect us and the doctors we trust to care for us when we are ill.
They have other accomplices in this,there can never be any doubt of that but the people we believed would protect us,would listen to us,would do what we as their constituents asked them to have done what they thought was best no matter what the opposition.
And in my head I imagine scenes like the one described here play out all over the world.......
In their justification, government, during the meet the press event held on Thursday, said the Act was not an imposition made by the government, especially when given the fact parliament exercised its own mind.
“We’re a democracy and, in it, there are ways in which we make laws,” said the prime minister Jigmi Y Thinley.
He said it was the responsibility of the leaders to prevent people from being victims of harmful effects of tobacco.
“It was as a result of this consciousness and awareness that local leaders took up this challenge of saving their communities, their people from harmful effects of tobacco,” said the prime minister. “One dzongkhag after another took up this challenge long before the National Assembly took it up as the national challenge.”
A law official, who preferred anonymity, said the law that surfaced through due process must be upheld and abided by. “Ignorance of law isn’t pardonable,” he said.
No comments:
Post a Comment