Palamu’s tobacco control campaign has reached 2,903 government, government-aided and private schools, with authorities conducting raids and imposing fines on sellers operating near school campuses, officials said. The district-wide effort was highlighted by a government middle school where students staged a Durga-themed performance to discourage tobacco and drug use on school premises and in surrounding areas.
The skit was performed at Rajyakrit Madhya Vidyalaya Rajwadeeh in Palamu last week, before the school closed for the Durga Puja holiday. Class 8 student Anushka Kumari appeared as Goddess Durga and used a trident to puncture five balloons representing substances and products associated with abuse, including cannabis, gutka, cigarettes and alcohol.
The performance was watched by 116 of the school’s 130 enrolled students. Headmaster Parshuram Tiwary, who conceived the play with support from other teachers, said the message was to eliminate tobacco and drug abuse from the school campus and its adjoining areas.
The school-led activity formed part of a wider campaign being implemented across Palamu district. District education officer Sandeep Kumar said the campaign had covered 2,903 schools across government, aided and private education systems. The scale of the drive places schools at the centre of local enforcement and awareness efforts rather than treating tobacco and drug access as an issue limited to individual student behaviour.
Authorities have also focused on sales around school campuses. Officials found tobacco products being sold within a 100-metre radius of schools at five locations. The identified sales points were located in areas where children and adolescents would ordinarily have access to school premises and nearby streets.
Palamu civil surgeon Dr Anil Kumar Sriwastwa said 19 raids had recently been carried out across schools and that offenders were fined a total of Rs 5,650. The raids indicate that the campaign combines awareness activities conducted by schools with inspections and penalties by district authorities.
For schools, the 100-metre enforcement zone makes the immediate surroundings part of the public-health response. Preventing sales near campuses requires coordination between education officials, health authorities and enforcement teams, while also placing responsibility on local administrations to identify and act against violations.
The Rajwadeeh school performance used a familiar cultural image to communicate the campaign’s message to students, but the district’s stated response also includes direct action against sellers. The next stage of the campaign will involve continued coverage of schools, inspections around campuses and enforcement against tobacco sales in restricted areas, according to the officials cited in the report.
