PAKISTAN Railways is a country unto itself — a large unmanageable country meekly trying to avoid a breakup. Yesterday’s edition of this paper carried three more ominous stories about the state of affairs in PR. For the second time in a fortnight, as many as 115 trains were suspended on Monday due to a shortage of locomotives. Then, it was reported that some 300 locomotives in the fleet were out of order. The third news report stated that the privatisation of PR workshops in Raiwind had cost the department Rs380m at a time when it was desperately in need of cash to survive. The workshop was earning Rs20m in annual profit before it was handed over to a PR subsidiary in the name of privatisation in 2001. Together, the three news items form a case for a rational approach where, instead of indulging in a romantic lament for the Pakistani train, prioritising a comprehensive remedial effort should be urged.

The huge organisation, whose abysmal condition is seen as a symbol of governmental apathy towards the state of the common man, cannot force the federal government to cough up the cash it has been demanding. PR’s ability to generate some funding of its own remains untested beyond an occasional project in partnership with the private sector. There is talk of expanding these partnerships as there has been a strong argument in favour of selling off PR land to generate money. All these suggestions and advice are eventually lost in the maze the department has been wrapped into.

It is just too large a problem and an extremely confusing one given the zigzag style of how things are run in this country. Maybe, decentralisation can help avert a breakup. For an earnest attempt at rejuvenation, PR could be divided into smaller more manageable sections with professionals hired from outside assigned to measure the viability and usefulness of each one of these sections. Some operations would have to be curtailed and fares increased, but there is no running away from this reality if Pakistani trains are to be put on the right track. Without consensus based on professional findings, it will remain a case of one individual’s preference against another’s. There would be expert calls for providing relief to passengers and simultaneously another set of experts would be pressing hard for investing in the future. Yet another would be calling for a total and immediate privatisation of the system. The losses resulting out of the privatisation of the Raiwind workshops are a reminder that the difficult course offers its travellers no short cuts.