Smoking in front of children: Connotes Child abuse
Dear Sir,
The music concert of Saturday (4th) evening at Kungstragordon (Stockholm) was exhilarating with lively music and drew a mammoth crowd including a lot of children. However while people and many children who were enjoying music, there were many smokers seen every now and then who were smoking brazenly in this crowd ignoring the health of these many children and non-smokers. I even saw mothers with their tiny tots in the same light !
I have been here for the last 3 weeks now and find Stockholm to be very disciplined and developed. I believe that in Sweden the rights of the citizens are given a lot of respect and dignity. However what intrigues me is that inspite of all the discipline and a system that recognizes the rights of individuals, is that people are smoking brazenly in public places. Even in my home country (Republic of India) where the government if yet to achieve the effective ensurance of the people’s rights, we have a law that ban’s smoking in public places.
Many smokers do not know that second hand smoke let out by them is many times injurious to others and this tobacco smoke (containing 4,000 chemicals) let out by them infringes on the rights of others to a healthy environment. If one understands human rights closely, then one is sure to agree that the right to life (the fundamental right) is synonymous to the right to health and right to a clean environment. Secondly I would also like the concerned citizens and parents to ponder that; if beating a child is child abuse, if psychologically tormenting a child is child abuse then isn’t damaging a child’s lungs connote child abuse ? Aren’t smokers who smoke in front of their and other children indulging in child abuse ?
I hope the points raised in my candid letter to the citizens of Sweden, thinkers, parliamentarians, social workers would provoke some thought and concern on this issue.
Frankly
RONALD REBELLO
Human Rights Activist
(Republic of India)
Add: Kungshamra 21:205
170 70 Solna, Sweden
Tel: 0735599185
Email:
yoursfrankly@rediffmail.com 
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