THE Pakistan Central Cotton Committee (PCCC) was established soon after Pakistan came into being. The PCCC came under the Pakistan Cotton Cess Act 1948. The committee being a quasi-autonomous body had the federal agriculture minister as its president. The Pakistan Institute of Cotton Research & Technology (PICRT) was further added to PCCC in 1956 to spur research.

In 2005, the PCCC was asked to give its site on M.T. Khan Road, Karachi to a foreign mission. One is still at a loss to understand why the PCCC had to do this when it was working all right without taxing government resources. Ironically, the troubles of the PCCC continue.

The Agricultural Division and the Cotton Marketing and Economic Research (CMER) of PCCC have been shifted to Multan where there is already a Central Cotton Research Institute (CCRI, Multan) of international standard to work with a multi-disciplinary approach. The PICRT has, however, been shifted to Site in Karachi.

The PCCC is now split in two parts. This in short is the story of the PCCC, the site of which was approved by the late Khwaja Nazimuddin, the then Governor General of Pakistan and the formal inauguration of the PICRT building was done by none other than Chaudhry Muhammad Ali, the then prime minister of Pakistan.

A Citizen

Karachi

Published in Dawn, July 3rd, 2015

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