ISLAMABAD, Feb 6 (APP):Pakistan Railways has installed as many as 7, 810 WAPDA meters at residential units of the department while remaining residential units will be handed over upto the DICOs by September 25 this year.
“The basic purpose of handing over of Railway residential units to DISCOs for direct billing to consumers and overcome the burden on the department,” an official told APP.
The official said that Pakistan Railways is also shifting electricity of its Railway Stations from WAPADA to solar system.
For this purpose, he said initially 155 Railway Stations will be shifted to solar system to improve service delivery, cost effective and sustainable operations.
To a question, he said rationalization of staff Pakistan Railways is conducting a right sizing exercise to improve efficiency, reduce costs and integrate new technologies for streamlined operations and enhanced productivity.
There has been exponential growth in pension since 2016 in the wake of new pension policy. Resultantly, yearly expenditure on pension which used to be Rs 20.4 billion in 2015-16 has increased to Rs 49.8 billion in 2023-24 registering an increase of 144 percent, he added.
The official said that Ministry of Railways has approached the federal government through summaries to the federal cabinet, ECC of the federal cabinet for transfer of pension liability of Pakistan Railway pensioners to the Finance Division/AGPR.
However, Finance division is of the view that Pakistan Railways is an autonomous commercial entity which is expected to generate enough revenue to meet its expenditures and due to current fiscal limitations faced by the federal government the proposal to transfer pension related liabilities of Pakistan Railways to the books of Finance Division is financially untenable.
He said the department is actively pursuing the matter with federal government to transfer pension liabilities to the books of Finance Division and creation of Public Service Obligation regime.
