More than 300 women from Hambantota District travelled to Colombo last week to press the government to adopt a “Tobacco-Free Generation” policy, handing President Anura Kumara Dissanayake a petition carrying close to 10,000 signatures.
The demonstration outside the Presidential Secretariat was organised by the Hambantota Women’s Development Federation and drew participants from across the district, Daily FT reported. It was peaceful, and went ahead despite the adverse weather affecting the island.
What the policy would do
The Tobacco-Free Generation framework is designed to phase smoking out permanently rather than reduce it. Instead of raising the legal age, it fixes a birth date: the proposal would ban the sale of all tobacco products to anyone born in or after 2010.
The mechanism works by never opening. Children born in 2010 turn 21 in 2031 — the age at which they would otherwise be able to buy tobacco legally — and under the policy that threshold would simply never arrive for them, or for anyone born later. The cohort ages past the legal purchase age without ever acquiring the right, and the eligible market closes from the bottom up as each year passes.
Two years of proposals, and no Cabinet paper
The policy has been put to the Health Minister repeatedly. The Sri Lanka Medical Association formally proposed it on two separate occasions, in 2024 and 2025. In 2026 the National Authority on Tobacco and Alcohol, together with the SLMA, submitted it to the Minister again.
Its status remains the same after all three submissions: the proposal has still not been put before Cabinet for approval. That is the gap the petition is aimed at — not a decision pending before ministers, but a proposal that has not yet been placed in front of them.
That distinction explains why the campaign has come from outside the health establishment. The medical bodies have exhausted the route available to them by submitting the proposal to the minister; a petition from 10,000 signatories in a single district applies a different kind of pressure at the point where the proposal has stalled.
Sourcing. Daily FT’s account is the only one located from a verified newsroom. The Island carries a headline on the same subject — “Appeal for tobacco-free generation policy in Sri Lanka” — but the page returns an unrelated article in its place, and could not be used. Note also that the protest took place last week, not on the day of publication; Daily FT does not give the exact date.
