In an emergency session held on Monday, the Lower House voted to impose 50 percent extra duties on imported tobacco and cash fines to those found selling tobacco to children. The law will also impose restrictions on those smoking in public places.
The Tobacco Control Act consists of five chapters and 25 articles, and bares likeliness to anti-smoking legislation that has swept across much of the developed world in recent years.
"In the law, 50 percent extra duties have been applied to tobacco and those who smoke in public places will have to pay a 300 AFG fine and traders are asked not to sell cigarettes to children," MP Mujeerurrahman Hamkanai said.
Despite the Act passing with a clear majority, a number of lawmakers expressed opposition to the law.
"This law should have been rejected because its against the Sharia law," MP Tara Khail Mohammadi asserted.
Yet its proponents held a different interpretation of Islam's take on tobacco, and by extension, the new law.
"From the Sharia perspective, we should ratify this law," MP Amanullah Paiman said. "We have to awaken the Ulema and society about the harms of the tobacco."
For the Act to become law, however, it must still be approved by the Senate.