The Ministry of Finance has sought a project digest (PC-1) from the Pakistan Railways (PR) which is seeking Rs11.5 billion emergency grant.
A Railways spokesman told The Express Tribune that PC-1 would be completed in a few days. After that, he said, they hoped the ‘much awaited’ bailout would materialise.
Meanwhile, the process of purchasing 150 new diesel locomotives is also underway. The PR is planning to get a soft loan from financial institutes for these locomotives, however, the final decision in this regard has yet not been taken.
Once the bailout package is released, the spokesman said, Railways would spend Rs6 billion to repair 148 of its non-operational locomotives. The remaining would be spent on upgrading coaches (Rs2 billion) and track (Rs2 billion). He said that 12 additional locomotives would become available every month with the funds. Till then, the situation of railways was likely to remain the same, he added.
Railways has suspended around 20 out of 58 branch line trains. The remaining trains on the same routes have been assembled as a single locomotive. According to a railways official, scheduling of several other trains was now decided on daily basis.
Another officer said that though the package was expected to be released in August, it would take more than six months to start the repairs and bring things back to normal. He said, to save time the manufacturers of locomotive spares might be contacted directly.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 28th, 2011.
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