Kolkata: Is a Shah Rukh Khan, an Ajay Devgan or a Rajnikanth responsible for inititating a starry-eyed 14-year-old into the world of smoking?

Yes, says a survey undertaken by the World Health Organisation (WHO) that puts the blame on insensitive film script writers and an ineffective censor board, which does not care.

"The survey of 450 films, mostly from Bollywood and a few from the South, made between 1991 and 2002, showed that 76 per cent of the films showed some depiction of tobacco use or the other," says WHO's national professional officer for the tobacco free initiative, Arindom Mookerjee.

The survey also showed that though smoking and chewing tobacco was earlier the sole domain of the 'bad guy' in films, more and more heroes and heroines, considered role models by impressionable teenagers, were incresingly taking to nicotine on celluloid.

Khan, Devgan and Southern sensation Rajnikanth headed the list of stars, who were luring youngsters into using some form of nocotine.

Disturbed with the findings, the WHO has charted out this year's 'No Tobacco Day' theme as 'tobacco free fashion, tobacco free films', Mookerjee said.

"Through this we are aiming at two things – attracting attention of the Censor Board to the fact that though laws against depiction of tobacco in films exist, they are hardly enforced. And sensitising script writers not to fall into the trap of insidious marketing techniques of tobacco companies," he said.

PTI