Shekhar Salkar writes to Amitabh Bachchan, urges him to stop promoting pan masala ad

President of National Organisation for Tobacco Eradication (NOTE) and Goa’s task force committee member, Dr Shekhar Salkar, on Thursday wrote a letter to actor Amitabh Bachchan, urging him to ‘withdraw from surrogate Paan masala advertisement and come forward to support the cause of Anti-tobacco / Anti-Paan masala movement’.

In his letter, Dr Salkar wrote: “As an Oncologist and member of NGO working in the field of tobacco cessation I am aggrieved and provoked to wage war against the dubious measures, such embellishment done by various influential and famous Bollywood actors like Shahrukh Khan, Ajay Devgn, Ranveer Singh, Hritik Roshan has led to increasing tobacco use among students, an age category that has now become a target audience for cigarette and tobacco companies, we consider the above names trivial, however you are the superstar of the millennium and a person with humanity, professionalism and integrity and we look up to you as pride of India."

Dr Salkar, in his letter, highlighted the harmful impact of consumption of Tabaco and Paan Masala products on society, urged Amitabh Bachchan to withdraw from the advertisement.

“Sir, millions of Indians follow you, and the youth of our country while idolizing you is immensely influenced by your actions, you are the brand ambassador for national health polices like Pulse Polio Program, and promotion of substances posing health hazard is not just ethically immoral and contradictory to the various measures taken by government to government to prohibit Tobacco and Paan masala consumption but also has an adverse impact on society.”

Earlier, Amitabh Bachchan has responded to a fan who asked him the reason behind endorsing a pan masala ad. The actor on Facebook responding to the fan and:  "If some people are getting benefits from an industry, we should not think as to 'why am I getting associated with it?' If it is an industry, then we too should think of it as our industry. Now, you may think that I should not be doing it, but I get paid for it.

In our business, there are a number of people who are workers and in a way they too get work and some money. Besides, gentleman, please don't use the word 'tatpunjiya'. It doesn't look good coming from you. It is also not fair on all the other workers in our industry."

Currently, the megastar is hosting Kaun Banega Crorepati's 13th season and is set to appear in various movies including Mayday, Jhund, Brahmastra, Goodbye and the Indian adaptation of The Intern.