Increased fares, long delays keep Pakistan Railways sluggish throughout 2019

• Passenger train fares were increased from 7 to 8 percent in 2019, fares of freight train were also increased by 20 percent to increase revenue.
• The railway administration could not improve the train timings, as trains continued to suffer long delays.

The performance of Pakistan Railways remained sluggish throughout the year 2019, as most of the trains suffered losses while financial difficulties of the passengers were increased after fares were raised a number of times throughout the year.

Pakistan Railways increased the revenue Rs4 billion, however the revenue increase came at the back of increase in fares that put additional burden on the passengers. Passenger train fares were increased from 7 to 8 per cent in 2019. Whereas, the fares of freight train were also increased by 20 percent to increase revenue.

Meanwhile, the railway administration could not improve the train timings, as trains continued to suffer long delays to reach the destination in the year 2019. The railway administration attributed the delay to degradation of tracks in summers and to foggy weather in the winter.

Credit should be given to Railway Minister Sheikh Rasheed after he signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with China for upgrading Karachi Peshawar Track ML1 under the CPEC (China Pakistan Economic Corridor) project.