Funds shortage imperils 3 mega projects

Three mega projects of the garrison city including Leh Expressway, Rawalpindi Ring Road and Ghazi-Barotha Hydropower have been postponed due to a severe lack of funds and continuous political turmoil. These three development projects are left at the mercy of the new government which will be formed after the upcoming polls.

The present Punjab and federal governments will not start these three projects in the current financial year i.e. till June 30, 2023, due to which the estimated cost of these three projects will increase by Rs20 to Rs40 billion.

In 2007, the Leh Expressway project was estimated at Rs17 billion. Its foundation stone was laid by the then President General (retd) Pervez Musharraf and the work was also started only to be stopped after the end of the former military dictator’s government.

Its estimated cost has now increased to Rs110 billion and by August-September 2023, the estimated cost will increase by another Rs20 billion due to the increase in the prices of cement, concrete and other construction materials.

The first route of the Rawalpindi Ring Road project was 40 kilometres for Rs30 billion. In the previous government, the route of the project was increased by 26km to 66km and the number of interchanges was increased to 10.

An industrial zone on 3000 acres, an education zone (IT university, technical college) on 700 acres, a modern theme park on 200 acres, a health zone on 300 acres, new state-of-the-art 1000-bed hospital, three residential zones on 6000 acres, a satellite town, and a heavy traffic terminal zone on an area of ​​100 acres was estimated to cost Rs110 billion.

After the ring road project scandal surfaced, the project was declared a hotbed of corruption and the expansion was cancelled and the old 40 kilometres route was restored. However, the new commissioner of Rawalpindi, Noorul Amin Mengal, raised a technical objection to it and submitted a report for its re-alignment, due to which the project went back to zero.

Later, the Buzdar government in Punjab changed and Hamza Shahbaz became the Chief Minister, and the Ring Road project was terminated. After the change of government, Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi became the Chief Minister again, and he restored the project. However, after new technical glitches and the re-allocation report of the ex-commissioner, the project has again become a victim of red tape and now the work on the project has been officially postponed.

In 2009, the estimated cost of the water project from the Ghazi-Barotha canal in the twin cities of Rawalpindi and Islamabad was Rs17 billion and in 2018, the cost increased to Rs80 billion. Now postponing the project to the new financial year on July 1, 2023, will bring the estimated cost to Rs135 billion.

Under this project, a 60-kilometre water pipeline was to be laid from Ghazi-Barotha to Singjani Water Plant. If these three projects were completed in time, the federal and provincial governments could have saved a total of Rs350 billion. Sources in the Rawalpindi Development Authority have confirmed further delays in all three projects.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 6^th, 2022.