LONDON: Sir Charles Tegari, who is famous for his anti-crime work in India and Palestine, has undertaken a great new drive against the black market in Britain reports the “Daily Mail” today [Jan 4]. Sir Charles has been given a staff of ex-army officers who are intelligence experts. Their names are secret. His organisation tackles only the biggest deals which, if left alone, would affect food rationing. The “Daily Mail” says black marketing in Britain has today assumed “the proportions of a national scandal”. The biggest of the black market-racketeers are former share pushers. Since the treasury banned banknotes over ten sterling as legal tender, black-marketeers use diamonds as “new currency”. According to the paper every black-marketeer of any consequence now carries a supply of diamonds, many of which are the proceeds of robberies.

[Meanwhile, as reported from Lahore,] A twenty-year housing plan to accommodate the increasing urban population in the Punjab is formulated in a comprehensive memorandum by Mr. U.A. Coates, Provincial town planner to the Punjab Government. He says: “There is likely to be enormous building activity in the Punjab after the war…”

Published in Dawn, January 5th, 2020