The Centre may introduce messages about the ill effects of tobacco and tobacco products in schools. The Health Ministry is reportedly in talks with the Human Resource Development Ministry to either print warnings on textbook covers or distribute posters to be put up in school premises, ANI reported.

The plan is not to include a separate chapter in textbooks, officials in the ministry said. The idea behind the move is to ensure that at a young age, children are made aware of how tobacco and its products can harm their body, Union Health Minister JP Nadda had explained recently.

Although it is illegal to sell cigarettes and other tobacco products within a 100-yard radius of educational institutes, they are sold without trouble near gates of schools and colleges across the country. The Health Ministry recently introduced a new rule, according to which pictorial warnings must cover 85% of the boxes containing tobacco products, including cigarettes, beedis, and non-smoking tobacco.