CPEC’S RAIL TRACK UPGRADATION TO BEGIN WITHIN 6 MONTHS: SAAD

[Muhammad Omar]

Multan—Federal Minister for Railways Khawaja Saad Rafiq said on Friday that work on rail track upgradation in the country under the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) would begin within next six months from Multan. Addressing a gathering of industrialists, the Railways Minister termed the CPEC as a game changing project to usher in a new era of prosperity in the country.
He said Multan and surroundings were plain areas and lie in the middle and hence beginning rail track up gradation from here would be easy. Saad Rafiq said rail track would be upgraded from Karachi to Multan, Lahore, Rawalpindi, Peshawar and up to Torkham. He said with the availability of upgraded modern track, trains would be operating at a high speed of 160 kilometres per hour.
Saad Rafiq announced that e-ticketing system would be operational in Railways soon that would enable people book seats from their home and make payments through fast money transfer facilities already available in the country. He said 80 per cent work on e-ticketing system had been completed and once operational it would resolve the problem of tickets sale through black marketing once and for all.
He said since the day he took over as Railways minister three year back, he encountered new problem every day. But, he added, he kept on moving forward while solving problems. The minister said Railways earnings would be around Rs 35 billion coming June 2016 which was just over Rs 18 billion when he took over the charge as minister.
He said freight trains’ earning was only Rs 1.8 billion which the Railways was projected to elevate to Rs 12 billion in June 2016. He said that provinces had the Railways land but recently KPK had transfered land to Railways and efforts would be made to get Railways land in other provinces too.
He said land record of Railways was undergoing computerization process. According to record available, Railways land measure around 167,000 acres. However, another 15000 acre land has been detected during the process of computerization of land record of Railways. Saad said double track had been laid between Lahore and Karachi, however, work on double track from La-hore to Peshawar was yet to be completed.
He said 11 railway stations were being upgraded and renovated on modern lines under the annual development plan while another 31 railway stations’ renovation including the one in Multan would be taken up in the second phase. He said air conditioned coaches would be attached to Multan-Rawalpindi Meher Express. He said that he was determined to upgrade rest of the trains but added that it would take at least three years to complete this task.
He said there was need for introduction of a fast train to run from Multan to Islamabad and a high level meet-ing would be held within next few days to discuss the matter. He said Railways was interested in running a cargo train from Karachi to Multan for transportation of business goods but business community of this area did not took interest in the initiative despite the fact that Railways was offering freight fare much below what truck containers charge and would ensure transpirtation in shortest possible time.
He said that Musa Pak train was running in losses and that is why a new train, Multan Express, was inaugu-rated today that would run from Multan to Lahore to compensate for losses incurred by Musa Pak train. He, however, added that this train was being introduced for 90 days with upgraded facilities like Wifi and oth-ers. Its financial performance would be reviewed after three months.—APP