Smokers of cigarettes and bidis are increasing vitally in India. Prolonged smoking not only leads to mortality, but also disability in people who are consuming it. (Murray CL, Lopez AD [1])

Over the period of 100 years in India, it is seen that the number of premature deaths are mainly due to adult male smokers aged ≥35 years (Neetu Chandra [2]). Estimation of mortality due to manufacture of cigarettes and bidis, are required to take control measures over the rise of tobacco industry. In this paper, estimation of number of cigarettes and bidis manufactured over a period of 100 years are carried out.

Firstly, estimation of cigarettes manufactured in India is considered. For which, 23 data sources are reviewed consisting of reports, trade and academic journals, paid internet data bases, repositories and reports. Few sources are considered to estimate the number of cigarettes manufactured during 1920-2010, which are as follows and represented in Fig. 1:

1. According to Cox [3], in India British American Tobacco (BAT) became the first British manufacturing multinational to INVEST in production capacity in early 1920’s. The author [3] could not arrive at exact number, but estimated around 17 billion of cigarettes manufactured.

2. In mid 1970- 2000, cigarette production [4] is as shown in table 1.

Table 1 Cigarette manufacture in millions during 1970-2000

3.

During 2006-2012, cigarette production has increased its sale (Ritesh Dwivedi , et al. [5]) and is represented as shown in table 2.

Table 2 Cigarette manufacture in millions during 2006-2012

Secondly, estimation of bidis manufactured in India is derived using data from the Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India, and divided it by the average tobacco contained in each bidi. Few sources are considered to estimate the number of bidis manufactured during 1975-2010, which are as follows and represented in Fig. 2.

1. It was found that bidi tobacco used for domestic consumption as shown in the table 3 for the year 1976-1982 [6]

Table 3 Bidis manufacture in millions during 1976-1982

Unit of Measurement 1970 1980 1990 1995 2000Cigarette Production

Sticks in millions62930 77376 61162 69589 75085

Unit of Measurement 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012Cigarette Production Sticks in millions 101084.0 99768.

691151.4

93322.8

95564.7

102768.5 108657.3

Unit of Measurement 1977 1978 1979

1980 1981 1982

Bidi Production Sticks in millions 155 125 142 160 175 190

2. During 1990-2000, number of bidis manufactured are given in table 4(Prakash C. Gupta et al. [7]

Table 4 Bidis manufacture in millions during 1991-2002

3. From 2003-2009 , number of bidis manufacturing has increased to billions as shown in table 5 (Pranay G Lal, Nevin C Wilson [8])

Table 5 Bidis manufacture in millions during 2003-2009

The total estimated cigarettes and bidis manufactured is shown in Fig.3. Based on estimation of cigarettes and bidis as discussed above, it can be concluded that manufacture of bidis is more when compared to cigarettes. Also, every year production and consumption is increasing leading to premature death in adult men and women of ≥ 35 years (Prakash C. Gupta [9]). Attributable deaths from smoking of bidis and cigarettes manufacturers are represented in Fig.4. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) [9] estimation, there were 100 million premature deaths due to tobacco in the 20th century and is expected to rise to 1 billion in the 21st century.

Unit of Measurement 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 2002

Bidi Production Sticks in millions 197.1 167.1 188.3

188.2 218.8

205.2 211.4

190.7 200

Unit of Measurement 2003 2004 2005 2008 2009

Bidi Production Sticks in millions 740,000 880,000 550,000 605,000 553,000

Figure 1 (Cigarette manufactured in India during 1970-2012)

19771978

19791980

19811982

19911992

19931994

19951996

19971998

20020

50

100

150

200

250

Bidi

Bidi

Year

Bidi

s M

anuf

actu

red

( in

mill

ion)

Figure 2 (Bidi manufactured in India during 1977-2002)

19701980

19901995

20002006

20072008

20092010

20112012

0

20000

40000

60000

80000

100000

120000

Cigarette

Cigarette

Year

Ciga

rett

e m

anuf

actu

red

( in

mill

ion)

19771979

19811990

19921994

19961998

20022007

20092011

0

20000

40000

60000

80000

100000

120000

0

50

100

150

200

250

Cigarette Bidi

Ciga

rett

es m

anuf

actu

red

( in

mill

ions

)

Bidi

s m

anuf

actu

red

(in

mill

ions

)

Figure 3 (Estimated cigarettes and bidis manufacture in India during 1970-2012)

19771979

19811990

19921994

19961998

20022007

20092011

0

20000

40000

60000

80000

100000

120000

0

50

100

150

200

250

Estimated Deaths

Deaths from Cigarette smoking Total deaths from smoking Deaths from Bidi smoking

Esti

mat

ed d

eath

s d

ue to

cig

arett

es

Esti

mat

ed d

eath

s d

ue to

bid

is

Figure 4 (Attributable deaths from smoking of bidis and cigarettes manufacturers )

References:

1. Murray CL, Lopez AD. Alternative projections of mortality and disability by cause 1990–2020: global burden of disease study. Lancet, 1997, 349: 1498–1504

2. Neetu Chandra (July 2013) Tobacco has killed 100 million young men in India in 100 yearswww.dailymail.co.uk/indiahome/indianews/article-2358494/Tobacco-killed-100-million-young-men-India-100-years.html (accessed on December 15, 2014)

3. Cox, H., (2000) The Global Cigarette: Origins and Evolution of British American Tobacco 1880–1945, Oxford University Press, Oxford

4. India Smoking Prevalence Tobacco economy siteresources.worldbank.org/INTPH/Resources/India.pdf (accessed on 15th December 2014)

5. Ritesh Dwivedi, Purna Satish (2014) Implications of Tobacco Industry in India, Parikalpana - KIIT Journal of Management, Amity University, Noida, UP

6. Tobacco in India – A Handbook of Statistics, (1983) Directorate of Tobacco Development, Ministry of Agriculture, Department of Agriculture and Co-Operation, Madras,; Annual reports on tobacco production, Chennai, Directorate of Tobacco Development

7. Prakash C. Gupta, Samira Asma (2008) Bidi Smoking and Public Health, Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India

8. Pranay G Lal, Nevin C Wilson (2011) The Perverse Economics of the Bidi and Tendu Trade, Economic & Political Weekly, vol. no 2, pp-76-80

9. Prakash C. Gupta , Hemali C. Mehta (2000) Cohort study of all-cause mortality among tobacco users in Mumbai, India, Bulletin of the World Health Organization

10. WHO Report on The Global Tobacco Epidemic, 2011. The MPOWER packge, warning about the dangers of tobacco. Geneva: