SUKKUR, Dec 31: Minister of State for Railways Mohammad Ishaq Khakwani has said that privatization of the Pakistan Railways is on the cards and except its core business all departments , like hospitals, schools and workshops, will be privatized before July 1, 2005.

He was addressing a press conference at the office of the divisional superintendent of the Pakistan Railways here on Friday. Mr Khakwani said freight services, passenger business and locomotive factories would not be privatized in order to provide better services to businessmen and people.

He said it was the firm commitment of the government to allow the corporate sector its due role in the current socio-economic scenario of the country. He recalled that Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz had been personally monitoring the process of privatization and had directed the Pakistan Railways authorities to speed up the process.

He said the Pakistan Railways was facing a deficit of Rs2 billion and it was forced to increase its fares by five per cent due to raising of petroleum prices. The minister said there had been a business boom for road transporters due to improvement of roads from Karachi to Peshawar.

He said the Pakistan Railways was facing a tough competition from the road transporters. Mr Khakwani said the Pakistan Railways was providing cheaper facilities to traders and travellers in comparison to road transporters.

He said the railways was performing a gigantic national duty of handling the Afghan Transit Trade, weight transport from the Karachi sea port as well as oil transportation in bulk from the port city to the hinterland without any loss of time.

The minister said it was being considered to remove weaknesses in the Afghan Transit Trade, and the ministry had also initiated simplification procedures. He said the railways officials had been directed not to consider themselves as "civil officers", because in competition with the private sector they have to be commercial-minded, and provide maximum facilities to people.

Regarding reopening of the Monabao-Khokhropar border railway route, the minister said, if the funds were made available today then it would take 18 months to complete the entire infrastructure including broad-gage railways track between the two stations.