MULTAN, April 12: About 300,000 bales of Grade-IV quality cotton were procured by the Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) during the 2004-05 season despite being mandated to deal only in Grades II and III.

The TCP had procured 1.615m bales of cotton in the season as the public sector intervention to uphold (lint) cotton prices at a level which might translate into officially fixed minimum price of Rs925 per 40kg for phutti (seed cotton) in order to ensure the growers a fair return of their hard work and investment.

The corporation was directed to spend resources on the procurement of cotton of not less than Grade II and III quality. But, surprisingly, in its tenders being floated for the sale of cotton from its stock, the corporation has been calling bids for Grade-IV cotton as well. So far, some 24,000 bales of Grade-IV have been sold out under two different tenders while bids for another lot of 3,000 bales of the same quality were called recently.

Classers and selectors engaged in the corporation’s procurement operation were supposed to ensure in the pre-purchase examination process that the cotton procured should not be of less than the prescribed grades. It is learnt that almost 19 per cent of the cotton procured by the TCP from ginners is of Grade-IV category.

When contacted, TCP’s general manager Sheikh Imtiaz said that the corporation had made final payments to ginners on the premium and discount basis after eventual evaluation of the stock in the TCP godowns in the presence of a representative of the Pakistan Cotton Ginners Association. He said the corporation had made 90 per cent payment to ginners on the basis of pre-examination of their stock vis-à-vis grade and quality while the remaining 10 per cent was subject to final assessment and, on its basis, to premium and discount.

He termed the procurement of about 300,000 bales of Grade-IV cotton as a ‘human error’, saying it became difficult for the assessors to appraise the appropriate grade and quality when they were working under pressure to make swift procurements to keep the cotton market stable.

However, analysts say that procurement of 300,000 bales of Grade-IV is not a trivial matter and should not be taken just as human error. They said that the TCP should announce if any action had been taken against its staff responsible for getting cotton of inferior grade and quality and against the ginners who ‘cheated’ the corporation to secure 90 per cent payment on the basis of Grade II or III while in fact they were delivering Grade IV cotton.

They say that the tricksters in fact secured 100 per cent or even more payment because the ‘erroneous assessment’ led to procurement of inferior quality cotton, while 90 per cent payment was made for the standard quality.

They also demand that the government should make public the findings of a probe conducted to ascertain the causes behind the two incidents of fire occurred within a few days in the TCP’s Rahim Yar Khan godown last year. About 42,000 bales, what the TCP claimed were of Grade II and III cotton, were gutted.