Senate standing committee: Railways minister asks for 400 locomotives
The Senate standing committee on Pakistan Railways (PR) met on Monday, discussing the troubles with PR in general but with a particular focus on the rehabilitation of locomotives.
The committee, chaired by Senator Maulana Gul Naseeb Khan, was informed that billions of rupees were required to repair the locomotives, maintain tracks, improve coaches and keep strategic reserves for diesel purchases.
Saeed Akhtar, the general manager of PR, told the committee that the railways currently employs 80,000 people, with 140,000 pensioners. However, he said that funds are low and salaries and pensions are at perpetual risk.
Senator Naseeb suggested ways to improve and modernise PR. He asked the officials to come up with a comprehensive approach to improve operational efficiency and financial viability. Referring again to locomotives, the committee said that there were no cases anywhere in the world where maintenance costs much more than the actual purchase of an item.
The committee urged the officials to repair the locomotives with expertise from within Pakistan. The committee also pressed for a “time frame” for the rehabilitation of PR, expressing hope for it to be an independent organisation. The federal government was also urged to release funds to meet the running expenses of PR.
Bilour demands locomotives to get PR back on track
Ghulam Ahmad Bilour, the federal minister for railways, asked the Senate standing committee for 400 locomotives; he also criticised the finance ministry for not releasing the proposed bailout package funds for PR.
Bilour told the committee that without sufficient locomotives it was impossible to run a railway service. He added that if the announced bailout package of Rs11 billion had been released on schedule, PR would be looking at a totally different scenario.
Bilour also complained that PR pays Rs4 billion in interest on loans already taken. He said that no one is ready to give a two-year guarantee for repaired locomotives but “we are operating 30 year-old locomotives”.
According to the federal minister, the railways were not provided with funds despite repeated assurances from the government. He also said that PR had planned to rehabilitate the locomotives with loans provided by banks, whereas with government funds PR will rehabilitate tracks, coaches and other infrastructure.
Senator Pervaiz Rasheed said that it appeared Bilour had no authority over the ministry. He said that Bilour should talk to the prime minister in this regard.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 22nd, 2011.
COMMENTS (6)
Comments are moderated and generally will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive.
For more information, please see our Comments FAQ
It is ridiculous that for all the talk of saving Pakistan Railways, no one (not even the experts or the media) mention the skewed policies of the government that are clearly biased against the Railways.
Revenues from freight transport, which is the profitable part of Railways operations, go to the National Logistic Cell, even though the expenses are incurred by the Railways. Railways is saddled with passenger transport, on which it takes a loss, in order to keep the costs down for citizens.Just correcting this anomaly will be enough to enable the Railways to drastically reduce their losses and possibly break even. Railways must be allowed to take back the management of freight operations, or at the least, demand a share of the profits from NLC from freight traffic handled by the Railways. No bail-out or change of minister or purchase/repair of locomotives will solve the problem long-term, unless the freight issue is fixed.
The railways should privatise as early as possible becuase private people run the railways better compare with burecratic officers who least bother on working and accountability. the ticketing system should improved rather inwhich railway police sell the train tickets in whole journey and 50% of tickets sell by the ticket checker and all money in their own pocket.
Like everything else in Pakistan, incompetent people are running railway. If they need to buy more locomotives, they should buy it from GE. They should not buy unreliable locos from China. China itself has bought 800 locos from GE in last 6 yrs.
Jea Minister for Railways you can hardly understand what he is saying .May God Bless Pakistan Railways under Mr Bilour .
If the Government is serious just change the minister it will be the first positive step
Its a great opportunity for rehabilitation of railways. All we need is sincere & capable leadership.
Plunder corruption has killed the railway let it Die Develop a Bus like Dewoo Shut down the railways