Leader of the Opposition V.S. Achuthanandan will inaugurate the year-long platinum jubilee of the Quilon Merchants Chamber of Commerce (QMCC) here on July 31.
Mayor Honey Benjamin will light the lamp and MPs N.K. Premachandran and K.N. Balagopal will speak.
QMCC general secretary Netaji B. Rajendran said the celebrations would be marked by social welfare activities.
He said the QMCC was formally constituted on May 1, 1940, under the Quilon Merchants Association (QMA) with Shah Shivraj Gopalji as president and Prakulam K.K. Kunjuraman as secretary. The QMCC was initially led by rice, yarn, and tobacco traders.
Mr. Rajendran said those were the days when Kollam was a renowned tobacco trading centre and the business hub of the town was known as Pukayila Pandaasala.
In February 1991, the QMA was renamed as the QMCC. At present, the QMCC had 396 members, the majority of them wholesale traders. Mr. Rajendran said its membership was restricted to those having registration of the Commercial Taxes Department.
