Foundation stone for Rawalpindi metro to be laid on Feb 28

Sharif says the journey to progress must continue.

LAHORE:

“Efforts for people’s welfare started during the last tenure of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz led government in the Punjab. This would continue during this term,” Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif said on Thursday.

He was talking to assembly members from several Punjab districts, including Mehdi Abbas Khan, Arif Mahmood Gul, Iffat Meraj Awan, Ghazali Saleem Butt, Khurram Abbas Sayal and Mehr Muhammad Fayyaz.

Stressing the need for development that benefits the deprived segments of the society, the chief minister said the Metro Bus Service had been a model project.

He said the service would soon begin in other major cities of the province as well.

He said the foundation stone of the Rawalpindi-Islamabad project will be laid on February 28. Planning for the Metro Bus projects in Multan and Faisalabad had already begun.

On energy crises

He said steps were also being taken to resolve the energy crisis.He said plans for generating electricity from coal in the Punjab had been announced. For this purpose, he said, six sites had been selected for installation of coal fired power plants. Sharif said economic development was being hindered by energy crisis. He said efforts were also being made to generate power using traditional methods as well as alternative resources. He said that coal-based power projects will start generation of electricity in three to five years. He said power generated on these sites could immediately be added to the national grid. He said that government was setting up two coal power plants of 660 megawatt with its own resources.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 7^th, 2014.