KARACHI: The Sindh government on Sunday announced that it was launching a new bus service in the city comprising “completely environment-friendly” fleet of electric vehicles.

Sindh Information and Transport Minister Sharjeel Inam Memon took to the social media to share brief details of the fresh initiative.

“Transport department government of Sindh is going to start New Bus service in Karachi. These are Pakistan’s first electrical vehicles which are completely environment friendly. From tomorrow we are going to start the test drive in the city,” he tweeted.

The fresh plan of the Pakistan Peoples Party government came amid ongoing projects of transport and back-to-back launch of new routes under its Peoples Bus Service.

However the sustainability of electric buses is still in doubt as only last year the same initiative couldn’t last long.

“The Sindh government in March 2021 took a similar initiative and launched the country’s first electric bus project in Karachi with a promise that by the end of the year, the number of these environment-friendly vehicles would rise to 100,” said a source privy to the details.

“The electric bus was launched to run from Tower to Sohrab Goth and the fare for one stop was fixed as low as Rs10. However, it didn’t prove sustainable and the only route launched came to a close,” the source said.

Published in Dawn, November 7th, 2022