The Ministry of Commerce and Industries instructed the Health Ministry to frame law banning manufacture and sale of e-cigarettes in the country as in the absence of the domestic legislation, it would not be possible to put a blanket ban on its imports. The Commerce Ministry stated that without banning domestic sale and manufacturing of Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems (ENDS) through the law, it will be an infringement of global trade norms to put an import ban. Electronic cigarettes or e-cigarettes are devices that do not burn or use tobacco leaves but instead vaporise a solution, which a user then inhales. As per the World Health Organization report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic 2017, governments of 30 countries which includes Mauritius, Australia, Singapore, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Brazil, Mexico, Uruguay, Bahrain, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, have already banned the Electronic cigarettes.
