THE Pakistan Central Cotton Committee (PCCC), an autonomous body under the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Livestock (Minfal) was established soon after 1947 with the mandate to undertake research and development work on cotton.
In addition to the Pakistan Institute of Cotton Research and Technology, established in 1949, the PCCC established two Central Cotton Research Institutes in Multan and Sakrand during 1970 and the Pakistan Cotton Standards Institute in Karachi during the 1980s.
The PCCC sponsored many projects that were implemented by provincial government in Punjab, Sindh and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
The Pakistan Central Cotton Committee generated its own funds by releasing cess on cotton which varied from time to time.
It established the Pakistan Institute of Cotton Research and Technology and its head office on Maulvi Tameezuddin Road, Karachi.
In 2005, the US Embassy picked the PCCC campus to relocate the US Consulate in Karachi. The PCCC was served with notices from the Karachi Port Trust and told to vacate the campus.
The PCCC and its laboratories that stood here for more than 50 years were given no chance to protest.
The PCCC vacated the building on Dec 1, 2005. Its campus was handed over to the US embassy at a cost of Rs589 million. It is not known as to how this price was determined. However, the PCCC did not receive any compensation.
The US embassy demolished the building and built a new US consulate on that land. The PCCC moved to a rented house that was far smaller than its needs and absolutely insufficient to accommodate PCCC offices and its institutes.
The PCCC moved to an even smaller location in September 2011.
A 50-year-lease agreement for the land, having retrospective effect from June 1950, was signed with the KPT on July 28, 1973.
The lease rent at that time was fixed at Rs0.37 per sq yard. After the expiry, the above agreement matter was taken up with Karachi Port Trust authorities that agreed to renew lease at the rate of Rs417.93 per sq metre per annum with four per cent escalation charges every year. Since the Pakistan Central Cotton Committee was surviving on cotton cess, having modest collection, the proposed rates were considered to be exorbitantly high.
Things stand at present as follows:
It is learnt from the press that the old building of the US consulate in Karachi is on sale via tenders.
The building is perfectly fit to house the PCCC and its institutes. It is requested that the government approach the US embassy to get the old US consulate building for the PCCC.
M. SHAFIQUE AHMED Karachi
