Lahore, December 25, 2018 (PPI-OT): Federal Minister for Railways, Sh Rasheed Ahmed has vowed to revive Pakistan Railways (PR), with the help of private sector in short span of time as the era of corruption is over now. Addressing the audience on the occasion of inauguration of Pakistan’s first ever freight train in private sector, he said that his ministry was inherited a huge sum of Rs35 billion from the previous regime. He accused that during last two regimes there was done nothing except purchasing locomotives at exaggerated price. Pakistan’s first ever freight train in private sector has left for its destination Lahore following cutting the ribbon by the Minister along with Governor Sindh, Imran CEO of Marine Group, Asim Siddiqui and CEO, Pakistan Railways Freight Transport Company (PRFTC), Zafar Zaman Ranjha.
The Minister has also assured to replace all existing mainline tracks under Project of ML 1 (Main Line, Karachi to Peshawar via Lahore) with the Chinese assistance. “ML 1 will be the revolutionary project which is meant to replace 1,750 kilometre tracks”, he said. He claimed that even Pakistan Steel would be revived through this project. He assured to initiate two more passenger trains from Sindh as occupancy rate is higher than 142 per cent in Sindh.
He also pointed out to remove encroachments from Railways land so that Karachi Circular Railways (KCR) should be revived. Sheikh Rasheed Ahmed said that the freight train project was the initiative of Marine Group’s Asim Siddiqui as he offered Rs3 billion a year revenue. He called upon the private sector to initiate more projects like freight train. The CEO of Marine Group, Asim Siddiqui said that project of freight train has been initiated following an agreement signed with Pakistan Railways Freight Transport Company (PRFTC) to run daily one goods train to Lahore from Karachi.
As per agreement, the freight trains will be run on daily basis in the first phase and then another train will be added later on between Lahore and Karachi while other sectors including Multan, Faisalabad, Sialkot would also be added into the network. He said that there would be four trains being operated daily by March 2019. Governor Sindh, Imran Ismail while appreciating the efforts made by Sh Rasheed and Asim Siddiqui to revive Pakistan Railways said that the present government is making is doing every possible effort to establish a corruption free society.
For more information, contact:
Director Public Relations,
Pakistan Railways
Lahore, Pakistan
Tel: +92-42-99203460
Fax: +92-42-99201632
Email: dpr@pakrail.gov.pk
Website: https://www.pakrail.gov.pk/