The Pakistan Railways (PR) will accelerate its ongoing anti-encroachment operation against land grabbers across the country to retrieve its land from individuals, groups and business organizations, said an official. He said that the railways leased off 4,694 acres of its valuable property during the previous four years in order to turn the department into a lucrative organisation by collecting more cash. According to a Ministry of Railways official, the land is located in the divisions of Lahore, Karachi, Peshawar, Quetta, Rawalpindi Multan, and Sukkur.

He stated that the government is taking many actions to reclaim encroached land from land grabbers, including conducting a comprehensive survey to identify encroached land occupied by people and government departments. For decades, the encroachers have been exploiting the property for residential, commercial, and agricultural purposes. The encroachment operation would be launched with the assistance of Railways Police and district administrations of the provincial governments, he added.

According to the source, FIRs are being registered and forwarded to PR judges for a speedy trial. He further stated that problems about the unlawful occupation and control of Pakistan Railways' land by government departments and institutions have been raised with the departments. The PR possesses 167,690 acres of property across the nation, according to the official, with 90,326 acres in Punjab, 39,428 acres in Sindh, 28,228 acres in Balochistan, and 9,708 acres in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. He stated that the department has begun special master level programmes in railway engineering in partnership with the Pak-Austria Fachhochschule Institute of Applied Sciences (PAFIST) to improve the competence of its engineers and technical employees.

The classes are being organized through the Pakistan Railways Training Academy Walton in Lahore. The special cell for foreign training has also been set up at the Ministry of Railways, said the official. A policy for transfer of technology and indigenization of railways rolling stock manufacture in Pakistan Railways facilities is being pursued in closer collaboration with the People’s Republic of China,” he added.

Credit: Independent News Pakistan-WealthPk