Sheikh Rasheed announces to run three new trains on immediate basis
Rasheed said in order to facilitate the passengers, the booking offices will remain open till 12am.
ISLAMABAD (Dunya News) – Federal Minister for Railways Sheikh Rasheed on Saturday has announced to run three new trains on immediate basis for the improvement of the department.
Addressing a press conference, Sheikh Rasheed said that Rohi Express will be plied from Pannu Aaqil to Khanpur, while another train will run between Mojenjo Daro and Sehwan Sharif. In order to facilitate the passengers, the booking offices will remain open till 12am, he added.
He said that a summary regarding 10,000 job vacancies has also been forwarded to Prime Minister Imran Khan.
He said that tenders for the provision of clean drinking water and other facilities would soon be opened.
The minister said that Mainline-I and Mainline-II were important for the country from which ML-I had been kept under China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) whereas the ML-II would be offered to the private investors for upgradation on BOT (Build-Operate-Transfer) basis.
He said that PR committee for investment opportunities would meet on every Thursday and the railways would welcome all investors. He continued that no improvement had been made in the freight sector and the number of freight trains were the same as it was twelve years ago.
He vowed to increase the number of freight trains from 10 to 15 within 120 days.
The minister said that Karachi was being made fright headquarters for the railways as Karachi was hub of the business.
To another question, Sheikh Rashid said that he wanted to sell two to three railways plots in Lahore and Karachi to overcome deficit of the railways. He said that Rs 38 billion was the current deficit of the railways while the railways was under debt of Rs 25 billion.
Earlier, Sheikh Rasheed had reaffirmed his commitment to bring down deficit of Railways to nil within one year. He said it has been decided to remove ghost contractual employees in the department to lessen financial burden.
Railways will soon be developed as a modern technical organization, he added.
---With input from APP
