Unpalatable as this may sound. Dr P S Vivek, sociology reader at the Institute of Distance Education, Mumbai University, presented this data to a stunned audience at a seminar on “Environment” at Shivaji University, Kolhapur, last week.

Vivek took up the study after he realized the number of spitters in the city is on the rise and after he was approached to speak at the seminar. “I wanted to know what effect spitting has on the environment,” he says.

So, during December 1998 and January 1999, he tracked down 400 spitters and asked them questions related to the habit and also collected their spit samples.

There was little or no resistance from those interviewed, as the researcher knew them. “There are ways of finding out the data you need, so I found spend some time with the persons,” says Vivek. “Basically, people never believed I was actually researching spitting habits.”

The samples show that on an average each spit sample weighs 3 gm. This data led him to deduce the volume of spit that can be generated by 10 per cent of the population of Mumbai, which is around 140 lakh.

On the same lines, it can be estimated that the city would generate nearly 5,36,550 kilo lt of spit per annum.

People interviewed were from all walks of life and from downtown to the suburbs.

Other facts thrown up show that an individual spits an average of 34 times a day and five times on each episode of tobacco or gutkha chewing.

Primary spitters are tobacco or gutkha chewers. This habit is typical of the Indian subcontinent and is also socially acceptable here.

People say they tobacco and gutkha “for better digestion” or “make lips red for beauty” or just for “time pass”.

The chewing starts at the age of 11 in many cases. Even women are increasingly taking to the habit, except for those between 41-45 years. A chewer spits around 3 cubic cms or 105 ml of saliva each time she chews gutkha or paan, says Vivek.

Apart from the environmental hazard, there is also a health hazard in spitting. One of the diseases spread by spitting is tuberculosis, which is steadily on the rise in the city, say experts.

How to curb the habit

• School children should be taught in schools harmful effects of spitting in public.
• School managements should take action against students found spitting in the school.
• Meeting of parents-teachers association should stress on bad effects of gutkha chewing.
• NGOs should step up their programmes by inculcating street plays, hoardings and awareness programmes within economically weak sections of society.
• Heavy fines for those who spit in public.
• Mohalla committees should campaign against it.
• Television/radio programmes.
• Involvement of women’s groups.
• College NSS units should do the same in colleges.