The South India Textile Research Association Textiles planned on a modern textile research association. The foundation stone was laid on 25 December 1955 by Prime Minister of India, Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and inaugurated by President of India Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan on 13 October 1958. The first chairman was R. K. Shanmugan Chettiar, also India's first Finance Minister. Padmabushan Kasturi Sreenivasan, who was the Director from 1955 till 1982 was instrumental in establishing SITRA as a major research institute and would later become chairman of National Textile Corporation. The institute is located on Avinashi Road, Peelamedu, Coimbatore near the Airport. The research center is governed by a Council
Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister of India Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister of India The Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister of India (PS to the PM; IAST: ) is the senior-most bureaucrat in, and the administrative head of, the Prime Minister's Office. The officeholder is generally a civil servant, commonly from the Indian Administrative Service and occasionally from the Indian Foreign Service. The post is considered one of the most influential in the Indian civil services, and some principal secretaries are considered more powerful and influential than senior government ministers. The Prime Minister's Secretariat (PMS)—headed by an officer of the rank of joint secretary to