PAKISTAN RAILWAY CRISIS AND ITS SOLUTIONS

 Thanks and Courtesy of : Mystereous Facts and Analysis  

Among the means of transportation railways are the cheapest and safest mode for passengers and goods. It also helps in growth of economy for the country. A plan for a rail system in Pakistan was first proposed in 1858.A survey for railway line was initiated by Commissioner of Sindh ,Sir Henry Edward Fere in 1858. It was proposed that a railway line from Karachi City to Kotri, steam navigation from the Indus /Chenab up to Multan and from there another railway to Lahore and beyond be constructed. Thus, it was on 13th May, 1861 that first railway line was opened for public traffic between   Karachi City and Kotri, the distance of 105 miles. The line between Karachi City and Kemari was opened in 1889  and  by 1897 the line from Kemari to Kotri was doubled.

Since 1861 when the first railway line was laid down between Karachi and Kotri, the expansion of the railway network by the British came at a rapid pace up until 1947. The driving factors for this growth were strategic and economic in nature. For instance to stop the invasion of the Russians from the West, the British built the Khojak tunnel, the fourth largest at that time, in seemingly inaccessible areas of Balochistan to reach Chaman railway station. But after 1947, little has been done to expand and maintain this network.

In Pakistan train were the primary mode of transport until the 1970s, but since then their share has declined due to a shift in government focus from rail to road transport. From 2005 to 2010, budgetary expenditure on railways was only Rs45.5bn compared to Rs155bn on the national highways.

The total length of railway tracks in Pakistan is 5,072 miles (8,163 km). and important railway routes and details of passenger train and freight in Pakistan are following :

1. Peshawar-Karachi via Rawalpindi- Lahore 

2. Karachi to Quetta via Kotri, Larkana and Jacobabad 

3. Quetta to Zahidan

4. Rohri to Quetta 

5. Multan to Jacobabad via Dera Ghazi Khan 

6. Quetta-Zhob 

7.Quetta to Chaman

8.Sibi to Khost 

Passenger Train

 Passenger traffic comprises 50% of the total revenue annually. During 1999-2000, this amounted to Rs. 4.8 billion. Pakistan Railways carries 65 million passengers annually and daily operates 228 mail, express and passenger trains. Daily, PR carries an average of 178,000 people. Pakistan Railways also operates special trains during occasions such as Eid- ul -Fitr, Eid- ul- Azha and Independence Day.

Freight

The Freight Business Unit, with 12,000 personnel, operates over 200 freight stations on the railway network. The Unit serves the Ports of Karachi and Bin Qasim as well as all four provinces of the country and generates revenue from the movement of agricultural, industrial and imported products such as petroleum oil & lubricants (POL), wheat, coal, fertilizer, rock phosphate, cement and sugar. About 39% of the revenue is generated from the transportation of POL products, 19% from imported wheat, fertilizer and rock phosphate. The remaining 42% is earned from domestic traffic.

The Freight Business Unit offers services to meet customer requirements and reduce costs through efficiency, innovation and modernization. All possible efforts are made to increase revenues and pass on the benefits to customers. The Freight Business Unit is headed by an additional General Manager.

The Freight Rates structure is based on market trends, particularly of road transport, which is the Railways' main competitor. The freight rates are no longer rigid but flexible, depending on the lead, peak-off peak season, and quantum offered.

  A year 1900 view of the Karachi-Kemari Train.

                                         

    Lahore Railway Station (stands as it was built by the British) 

 The Steam Engine finally resting outside Lahore Railway Station

                                   

PR is facing losses due to mismanagement, poor maintenance and weak ticket checks that allow people to get away with not paying for their tickets. There have also been political interventions in decision-making about which new routes to open. Furthermore, PR is not allowed to charge a market-clearing price; fares have always been dictated by the federal government.

According to the National Disaster Management Authority, the heavy floods have caused a loss of Rs.6.7 billion to the railway network as several hundred kilometers of lines were washed away. The railway coaches were also the targets of angry mobs and arson attacks after Benazir Bhutto’s assassination resulting in huge losses. Out of 522 total engines only 220 are in working order, out of which 100 are in poor condition. Ghulam Balour, Federal Minister of Pakistan Railways, has not made any effort to hide his helplessness over corruption affecting the department and the need for new locomotives.

The addition into problems of railways began in January 2011 when a cheque for Rs700 million issued by Pakistan Railways to Pakistan State Oil was not honored. The PSO subsequently stopped the supply of fuel to Railways. According to a senior officer at Railways headquarters in Lahore some 30 freight trains had to be stationed in yards near major railway stations across the country and only one freight train left for Muzaffargarh on Sunday. On an average, eight freight trains leave for Sindh for various destinations daily.Their are not enough funds for payment to PSO for high speed diesel to keep all freight trains running. The Railways have also not received a single penny from the Rs11.1 billion package recently approved by the cabinet.

I am also confused that if people wants to obtain urgent ticket reservations, they will not get the empty place in any train, and even on our major holidays i.e Eid- ul -Fitr, Eid- ul- Azha and Independence day if you want to travel then you must have an advance booking at least fifteen days or more, and the special trains are other then normal daily routine, innocent and poor people wait for the trains many many hours more then ten hours and sometime fifteen to twenty hours, and I have not seen any train to come at time in my twenty five years of life, six to seven hours train late is the normal routine in our country, why their is no accountability for them, are they not citizen of Pakistan? while if any air craft late for few minutes, it become the headlines of TV channels, although the journey taken by the eighty percent    (backbone of the country) people of Pakistan, no one is consolidating at it, why this important institution of government is facing deep financial riddle after having colossal revenue and other conundrums, where the earnings of this organization are going, who is taking the compensation of this organization. 

Followings are some of the suggestions to improve the condition for railway system of Pakistan:

1- First of all government should eradicate corruption in railways sector. Corruption is the menace that is destroying many sectors of Pakistani society. 

2- Pakistan Railways should be privatized. This is also the possible solution of problem because currently government of Pakistan has to bear the huge losses monthly. Other benefits of privatization of Pakistan Railways include the increase in service quality and expansion of Railways because government has nothing to invest in PR. 

3- Government should ask Chinese for help in order to make it profitable organization because China has made wonderful progress in railway industry. As China did in several other sectors including coal and nuclear power generation and manufacture of automobiles it has granted access to its enormous market by insisting on the transfer of technology. It has managed to develop its railway industry to the point at which it was able to out-compete the established systems in Europe and North America in winning the contract to build a high speed line connecting Mecca with Medina.

4- India is also making impressive strides in the railway sector. The underground system in Delhi has won the admiration of many foreign experts for its engineering as well as management. The inter-city system is being modernized in terms of both the quality of service on offer as well as the new equipment being used. The Indian and Chinese systems are by far the largest in the world and the two countries as a result of the advances they are making will come to dominate the world railway industry and business. Pakistan being a neighbor of these two rapidly growing and giant economies could benefit enormously from the development of the two systems.

5- Pakistan is blessed with coal reserves and a single Thar coal reserve of Sindh is about 850 Trillion Cubic feet which is more than oil reserves of KSA and Iran put together i.e. 375 billion barrels. 

Chinese and other companies had not only carried out surveys and feasibilities of this project but also offered 100 percent investment in last 7 to 8 years but the “Petroleum Gang” always discouraged them in a very systematic way. If these reserves are exploited properly then the deficiency of fuel can be catered for the railways.

In conclusion, the best solution of this problem is the privatization of Pakistan Railway. We can take the example of PTCL; before privatization PTCL's monthly losses were in billions. Today it is not only a profitable organization but also providing excellent services to the customers. Corruption in Pakistan Railways can only be removed by privatization of Pakistan Railways.