RAWALPINDI, Nov 28: With divisional railway running out of diesel, trains originating from Rawalpindi are likely to stop from Tuesday.

A senior Railway official told Dawn on Monday that Pakistan Railways had stopped issuing tickets for trains scheduled to depart on Tuesday (November 29).

“I wanted to reserve seats for Lahore but the booking staff informed me to check the train time before arriving at Railway Station and it will be better to get ticket at Railway Station,” said Raffique Ahmed, at Railway Reservation Office, Saddar.

Yasir Hafeez said he came to reserve seats for Quetta for Tuesday but the officials informed that the train to Quetta time table was tentative and it would be better to book seats for Wednesday. “The diesel stock is finished as only two or three trains originating from Rawalpindi will operate on Tuesday,” the Railway official said and added that the head office had been kept informed about the current situation of fuel.

He said total 17 trains operated from Rawalpindi for different parts of the country including Quetta, Karachi, Lahore, Multan and Peshawar. He said that the daily requirement of these trains were approximately 35,000 liters of diesel.

He said total 1,000 to 1,500 liter was available with the Rawalpindi Divisional office and it forced the local authorities to stop the train traffic from the division. However, he said that the trains coming from other stations would continue their routine service.

“More than six locomotives, repaired recently at Central Diesel Locomotive (CDL) Workshop in Rawalpindi, have again developed fault, which would also make Pakistan Railways to cancel its trains from Rawalpindi to Lahore once again,” he said.

When contacted, Pakistan Railways Divisional Superintendent Munawar Shah admitted that railway was facing diesel shortage and it would be difficult for it to run trains from Rawalpindi.

He said Pakistan Railways high ups had been informed and the freight train carrying diesel would reach Rawalpindi on Monday night or Tuesday morning.—Aamir Yasin