A picture, they say, is worth a thousand words. The anti-tobacco lobby is learning to use that dictum to its advantage. Gory and graphic pictures of cancer stricken patients occupy 30 per cent of the surface of a cigarette packet in countries like Thailand, Hong Kong, Canada and Australia. As a result, say anti-tobacco lobbyists, tobacco use has fallen. "Even a 1 per cent reduction in the number of tobacco users means 100,000 lives can be saved. I think, therefore, that these labels are important," says Judith Mackay, co-ordinator, World Lung Foundation. Next, on the list is India. Douglas Bettcher, director, Tobacco Free Initiative (tfi), who, and the other members of the tfi are campaigning for the introduction of pictorial warning labels on tobacco product packaging. Of course, tobacco companies are not happy. What scares them is the success of these labels. Countering the anti-tobacco lobby, a spokesperson of a prominent tobacco company says that, pictorial warnings or not, tobacco use will continue and that printing these large images will only raise costs without serving any purpose. If this rule is to be implemented in India, it will present the manufacturers of cigarettes with a serious dilemma. Cigarette packages with gory images are a far cry from today's cigarette packets, which carry the small statutory warning: Cigarette smoking is injurious to health. "There will be an encountercounter effect - the consumer will encounter the images and the cigarette companies will be forced to counter them," says Jagdeep Kapoor, chairman and managing director, Samsika Marketing Consultants. "It will have to balance between care and scare. While the short term may see a slump in sales, in the long run, it won't have much of an impact. Marketers will have to think of new and novel ways to market their products," Kapoor adds. The companies, he feels, had better plan out their strategies at the earliest as, sooner or later, these labels will become compulsory the world over. What remains to be seen is whether the tobacco lobby has its way and can avoid implementing the labels. If the health minister and the anti-smoking lobby have their way, tobacco marketers are in for some serious brainstorming.