The Bombay High Court Monday issued a notice to the Maharashtra government on petitions challenging the blanket ban on opening and running hookah parlours in the state.
A bench of Chief Justice Naresh Patil and Justice M S Karnik directed the state to file its reply by December 17.
The bench was hearing a bunch of petitions filed by owners of hookah parlours, in which they have challenged a new law brought into effect by the state government in October.
On October 4, the Maharashtra government brought into effect a statutory amendment to the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products (Prohibition) Act (COTPA) of 2003 to ban hookah parlours.
The new Act is called COTPA (Maharashtra Amendment) Act, 2018 and was granted the President's assent in September.
It prohibits any person from "owning or opening and running on behalf of someone else, a hookah parlour at any place in the state, including at eating houses."
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