Arundhati Roy book: Kerala HC dismisses PIL seeking stay on sale over cover photo showing her smoking

The Kerala High Court on Monday (October 13, 2025) dismissed a public interest litigation (PIL) filed by a lawyer before the court on September 18, seeking a stay on the sale of Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy’s recently published book.Our Lady Comes to MeIn the cover photo, he is seen drinking beedi.

The Advocate-Petitioner argued that the book does not contain any legal health hazard warning labels regarding smoking and that this is a violation of Section 5 of the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products (Prohibition of Advertising and Regulation of Trade and Commerce, Production, Supply and Distribution) Act, 2013. It was later revealed that the back of the book contained a written disclaimer regarding the ill effects of smoking.

cover page of the book

While hearing the petition on Monday, the Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Nitin Jamdar and Justice Basant Balaji said it was up to the executive committee constituted under the Act, after hearing the parties, to decide whether the matter was a violation of Section 5 of the Act. In this case, the petitioner, despite being informed, refused to take up the matter before the committee.

He submitted the petition without reviewing the statutory provision and without checking whether there was a written disclaimer at the back of the book. In view of the circumstances, the petition was dismissed, keeping in mind the caveat that the court should ensure that PILs are not used as a means of self-promotion or personal defamation.

The petitioner’s lawyer had argued last Tuesday that the disclaimer stated at the back of the book was inadequate and should have been prominently published. He said the photo on the front page, which did not include a disclaimer, had the potential to send a misleading message to impressionable young people, particularly girls and women.

The centre’s counsel had then submitted that such complaints could also be registered outside the management committee, through an online portal set up under the national tobacco control programme. These options had to be tried instead of directly approaching the Supreme Court in the garb of PIL.