According to the press reports, Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry has held the Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) responsible for a sugar crisis that is on anvil in the country. The TCP, you might recall, failed to import sugar in April when international prices of the commodity were at their lowest. The country consumes about 4.2 million tons of sugar annually while as per the statistics of Ministry of Food and Agriculture, the sugar production this year was only about 3.4 million tons. That leaves a gap of about one million tons which TCP was supposed to import to cater for the excess demand. Due apparently to a connivance of government officials and sugar barons, the TCP has not imported the required quantity of sugar in time. Sugar is already being sold at Rs. 70 to 75 per kg and its prices are thought to be likely over Rs. 100/kg in the holy month of Ramadan. The question is why the government is not allowing free import of sugar by the private sector? The answer is that if government allows the private sector to do so, it would not be possible for our high government officials to take money from the sugar barons to whom full co-operation is being extended for helping them make huge windfall profits from helplessness of the consumers. If the government was sincerewhich it is expected to be as it is answerable to the masses it should have at least launched an awareness campaign by now in print and electronic media that sugar is injurious for health so that people think of reducing sugar consumption. That way, the country would not have to spend precious foreign exchange on import of sugar and the domestic prices would have got reduced too. ENGR. S.T. HUSSAIN, Lahore, July 15.