Pak Railways retrieves 618.5 acres land from encroachers from 2015-19

ISLAMABAD: Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Ali Muhammad Khan on Thursday told the Senate that from July 2015 to March 2019, Pakistan Railways managed to retrieve/regularize 618.5 acres land from encroachers.

Replaying to a question on the behalf of Minister for Railways, he said an area of 137.002 acres (89.492 acre individual & 47.510 acre government department) of Railway land has been encroached during last five years (which also includes 11.04 acres of land at Peshawar which was originally given on lease but after expiry of lease the lessee did not vacate the land and get stay order from the Court) having assessed value 3 of Rs. 5641.174 million, he added.

The minister said that it was the responsibility of the government to vacate the state land form the encroachers adding that Pakistan Railways is not removing Kach abadies from the Railways land.

To another question, Ali Muhammad Khan told the House that Pakistan Railways is being upgrading the speed of the trains from 105 kilometer per hours to 120 kilometer per hour.

He said that scope of upgradation of ML¬I of Pakistan Railways will be carried out in phased manner.

Feasibility study was conducted at the approved cost of Rs. 350.000 Million, afterwards, work on preliminary design has been initiated and is still under process, he added.

Minister said the approved cost of Preliminary Design is 10,641.634 Million. 11 On completion of design, PC¬I for “Up¬gradation of ML¬I” (Phase¬I) will be prepared and commitment of funds against the project will be available at the time of approval of PC¬I.