HYDERABAD, Sept 25: The Sindh Chamber of Agriculture has expressed satisfaction over orders issued to sugar mills by the Sindh Cane Commissioner to start the crushing season on October 1.

At a central committee meeting, the chamber noted that the cane commissioner has sent the directive to start the crushing season from October 1 under the Sugar Factories Act.

Syed Qamaruzzaman Shah presided over the meeting.

The meeting expressed concern over offering of Rs1,200 per 40kg for the chilli crop by traders whereas actual price was Rs2,000 and last year chilli was sold for Rs2,500.

The chamber authorized Mr Shah to take up the issue in the next Export Promotion Bureau meeting to fix prices at Rs2,000 per 40kg.

It took notice of the refusal of loans to farmers of Badin

district by the agriculture bank.

The meeting demanded that the bank should provide loans on the production of pass books only without asking for surety or clearance certificates.

INCOME TAX: The Hyderabad zone income tax commissioner, Abdul Aziz Memon, announced here on Sunday that the tax returns could be filed at any of the following options.

The offices of the income tax department, the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, State Bank of Pakistan, and at the Fatima Jinnah road and Sarafa Bazaar branches of the National Bank of Pakistan.

He said the income-tax staff would be present at the counters to facilitate the tax-payers.

DEMAND: More than 50 writers and teachers have demanded that the Urdu scripts of students of Sindh be checked only by Sindhi teachers.

In a joint statement issued here on Friday, Ibrahim Joyo, Noorul Huda Shah, Prof Liaquat Aziz, Taj Joyo, Sarkash Sindhi, Rashid Morai, Dr Sarfaraz Bhatti, and Khaki Joyo said the intermediate boards of Hyderabad, Sukkur, Larkana and Mirpurkhas were violating the 32-year-old policy by giving examination copies of Sindhi-speaking students to Urdu-speaking teachers.

They feared that such assessment would deprive 60,000 students of Sindh to get admissions in professional colleges.

The scholars appealed to the Sindh chief minister, governor and the education minister to direct educational boards to follow the old policy of script checking.