Karachi-Peshawar Railway Project Cost Doubles Due to Numerous Delays

Due to delays, the development cost of the ambitious Main Line-1 (ML-1) railway project has more than doubled. This has made acquiring funding a lot harder for the government.

Envisaged under China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) in 2016 with an estimated $6 million cost and financial assurance from Beijing, it will now cost $13 million. Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif highlighted this during the Pakistan Railways (PR) meeting.

A source privy to the meeting told Dawn that the government received no financial assistance to complete the project. Therefore, the PM had ordered the authorities to at least start the first phase from Karachi to Sukkur using government funds.

The meeting was informed that China had pledged to pay for the ML-1 project. Although, the country is yet to give any confirmation in this regard.

The current administration blamed the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf administration for “jeopardizing” the project by switching plan ML-1 from a Build Operate Transfer (BOT) to an Engineering Procurement and Construction (EPC) model.

Source: Pro Pakistani