LAHORE: The Pakistan Railways is set to close the operation of the railcar running between Lahore and Rawalpindi from Sept 15 due to low passenger occupancy and other issues.

Also under consideration is the closure of Jinnah Express -- a VIP train running between Lahore and Karachi that was inaugurated by Prime Minister Imran Khan a few months ago. The railways has already closed down Dhabeji passenger train in Sindh that was launched and inaugurated by President Arif Alvi in November last year.

“Both railcar and Jinnah Express are running into losses as the passenger occupancy ratio is hardly 50pc. So the railways administration has decided to close down operation of the railcar from Sept 15. The management has also proposed closure of Jinnah Express but the higher-ups have not allowed it to do so at this stage,” an official source told Dawn on Thursday.

Federal Railways Minister Sheikh Rashid has been claiming credit for the last one year for running 32 new trains, reducing deficit by Rs4 billion, taking the number of passengers to more than seven million, saving diesel, reviving and expediting the ML-1 (main line-1) project under the CPEC etc.

The situation is to the contrary as many people including drivers have lost their lives or suffered severe injuries in accidents in recent times. Almost 80 cases of derailment occurring owing to rundown tracks, faulty signalling system, rail traffic congestion, human error, shortage of staff and other issues have been reported.

“The result of cosmetic measures and mismanagement are for all to see. The management will have to focus on real issues (such as rehabilitation of the track and other infrastructure) the PR ignored during the recent past,” another official said.

In May last, the PR had informed the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Railways about running of six of the 10 newly-launched passenger trains during first 100 days of the PTI government into loss. The officials while presenting a report on the benefit-cost ratio of the new passenger trains had informed the committee that the trains including Mianwali railcar (Rawalpindi and Kundian via Mianwali), Shah Latif Express (Dhabeji to Mirpurkhas via Jung Shahi, Jhimpir, Kotri, Hyderabad, Tando Adam and Tando Allahyar), Rohri passenger train, Moenjadaro Express, Faisalabad non-stop train and Rawalpindi Express were found to be in loss due to low passenger occupancy and other operational issues.

“In its annual performance report submitted to the PM, the PR, besides loss of precious lives, also concealed a huge loss caused to locomotives, passenger coaches, freight containers, wagons, track and other material in a number of fatal and non-fatal accidents,” he said.

He said after the closure of trains including Dhabeji Express that was facing a daily loss of over Rs80,000, their locomotives, coaches, crew etc would be used to strengthen operation of other trains.

An official of the PR confirmed closure of the railcar train from Sept 15. “Yes, the railcar wouldn’t be available from Sept 15 but Jinnah Express’s operation is still intact as the senior officials have deferred any measure to further assess passenger occupancy,” the official said.

Published in Dawn, September 6th, 2019