more-in Urging the government to abandon plans to sell land belonging to Anglo French Textiles (AFT) as a measure to clear liabilities of the mill, former Member of Parliament M. Ramadass said a committee comprising experts from the field of textiles should be constituted to revive the defunct mills. In a statement, he said the government should plan modernisation of all five textile units, including SPINCO and Jayaprakash Mill at Karaikal, by bringing them under one management. Stating that integration of the mills would unleash enormous internal and external linkages and largescale production, he said SPINCO and Jayaprash mills utilised cotton as input. The required cotton could be cultivated at Karaikal through cooperative farming. The selection of the land should be left to the Agriculture College at Karaikal, he said. The yarn thus produced could be used by AFT, Swadeshi and Bharathi mills. The integrated unit should establish a garment factory and the government could seek the assistance of the Ministry of Textiles to market the clothing materials, he said. The mills suffered losses due to engagement of more administrative personnel, failure to appoint experienced people at production and management levels and corruption to the tune of ?130 crore as per the white paper released by the government, he said. “The decision to sell the property to settle dues of the workers is unacceptable,” the statement said.

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