Pakistani Vs Indian Railways Comparison:

First of All I must have some introduction about Pakistani Railways.

Introduction:
Pakistan Railways (reporting mark PR) is a national state-owned rail transport service of Pakistan, headquartered in Lahore. It is administered by the federal government under the Ministry of Railways. PR provides an important mode of transportation throughout Pakistan. It is commonly referred to as the "life line of the country", by aiding in large-scale movement of people and freight throughout Pakistan. The current chairman is Ghulam Ahmed Bilour. The network has 7,791 route km, 559 stations.

History
The idea of a rail network was first thought of in 1847, with the possibility of Karachi becoming a major seaport. Sir Henry Edward Frere, who was appointed as the Commissioner of Sindh, sought permission from Lord Dalhousie to begin a survey for a Karachi Seaport and a survey for a railway line in 1858. The proposed railway line would be laid from Karachi (city) to Kotri. On May 13, 1861, the first railway line was opened to the public, between Karachi (city) and Kotri, with a total distance of 105 miles (169 km). By 1886, there were four railway companies operating in what would become Pakistan. This would eventually become Pakistan Railways in 1947.
In 1947, At the time of independence, 1,947 route miles (3,133 km) of North Western Railways were transferred to India, leaving 5,048 route miles (8,122 km) to Pakistan. Now we include the Indian

Railways History and Introduction:

Indian Railways (reporting mark IR) is a departmental undertaking of Government of India, which owns and operates most of India's rail transport. It is overseen by the Ministry of Railways of the Government of India. Indian Railways has 114,500 kilometers (71,147 mi). of total track over a route of 65,000 kilometers (40,389 mi)[4] and 7,500 stations. It has the world's fourth largest railway network after those of the United States, Russia and China.[5] The railways carry over 30 million passengers and 2.8 million tons of freight daily.[4] [6] It is the world's second largest commercial or utility employer, by number of employees, with over 1.4 million employees.[4] As for rolling stock, IR owns over 240,000 (freight) wagons, 60,000 coaches and 9,000 locomotives.

History:
Railways were first introduced to India in 1853. By 1947, the year of India's independence, there were forty-two rail systems. In 1951 the systems were nationalized as one unit, the Indian

Railways, becoming one of the largest networks in the world. IR operates both long distance and suburban rail systems on a multi-gauge network of broad, meter and narrow gauges. It also owns locomotive and coach production facilities.

We see the graphical comparison between Indian and Pakistani Railways;

Explaination:
Track and gauge Indian railways uses four gauges, the 1,676 mm (5 ft 6 in) broad gauge which is wider than the 1,435 mm (4 ft 8 1 2 in) standard gauge; the 1,000 mm (3 ft 3 38 in) metre gauge; and two narrow gauges, 762 mm (2 ft 6 in) and 610 mm (2 ft) . Track sections are rated for speeds ranging from 75 to 160 km/h (47 to 99 mph). The total length of track used by Indian Railways was about 114,000 km (71,000 mi) while the total route length of the network was 64,215 km (39,901 mi) on 31 March 2011.About 33% of the route-kilometre and 44% of the total track kilometre was electrified on 31 March 2011.

Pakistan Railways Had a mixture of gauges, Broad gauge (1,676 mm or 5 ft 6 in), Metre gauge (1,000 mm or 3 ft 3 3/8 in) and Narrow gauge (762 mm or 2 ft 6 in). Few Metre gauge & Narrow gauge railway lines have converted in to Broad gauge and remaining have abandoned or dismantled. Now only Broad gauge railway lines are operational in Pakistan Railways network.

Speed
The maximum Speed of Pakistan Railways is 120 km/h. Some sections of Karachi-Lahore main railway line allow 120 km/h speed. Work is in progress to improve railway track on KarachiKhanpur section to increase speed to 140 km/h. While the maximum speed on Indian railways is 130km/hr.

Traffic
Passenger

Passenger traffic comprises 50% of the total revenue annually. During 1999-2000, this amounted to Rs. 4.8 billion. Pakistan Railways carries 65 million passengers annually and daily operates 228 mail, express and passenger trains. Daily, PR carries an average of 178,000 people. Pakistan Railways also operates special trains during occasions such as Eid ul Fitr, Eid ul Azha, Independence Day and Raiwind Ijtema.
Freight

The Freight Business Unit, with 12,000 personnel, operates over 200 freight stations on the railway network. The Unit serves the Ports of Karachi and Bin Qasim as well as all four provinces of the country and generates revenue from the movement of agricultural, industrial and imported products such as petroleum oil & lubricants (POL), wheat, coal, fertilizer, rock phosphate, cement and sugar. About 39% of the revenue is generated from the transportation of POL products, 19% from imported wheat, fertilizer and rock phosphate. The remaining 42% is earned from domestic traffic. Now Indian railways:
Freight

IR carries a huge variety of goods ranging from mineral ores, fertilizers and petrochemicals, agricultural produce, iron & steel, multimodal traffic and others. Ports and major urban areas have their own dedicated freight lines and yards. Many important freight stops have dedicated platforms and independent lines. Indian Railways makes 70% of its revenues and most of its profits from the freight sector, and uses these profits to cross-subsidize the loss-making passenger sector. However, competition from

trucks which offer cheaper rates has seen a decrease in the proportion of freight traffic carried by rail in recent years. Since the 1980s, Indian Railways has switched from small consignments to larger bulk goods which has helped speed up its operations. Most of its freight earnings come from such rakes carrying bulk goods such as coal, cement, food grains and iron ore.

Indian Rail budget and finances

The Railway Budget deals with planned infrastructure expenditure on the railways as well as with the operating revenue and expenditure for the upcoming fiscal years, the public elements of which are usually the induction and improvement of existing trains and routes, planned investment in new and existing infrastructure elements, and the tariff for freight and passenger travel. The Parliament discusses the policies and allocations proposed in the budget. The budget needs to be passed by a simple majority in the Lok Sabha (Lower House). The comments of the Rajya Sabha (Upper House) are non-binding. Indian Railways is subject to the same audit control as other government revenue and expenditures. Based on anticipated traffic and the projected tariff, requirement of resources for capital and revenue expenditure of railways is worked out. While the revenue expenditure is met entirely by railways itself, the shortfall in the capital (plan) expenditure is met partly from borrowings (raised by Indian Railway Finance Corporation) and the rest from Budgetary support from the Central Government. Indian Railways pays dividend to the Central Government for the capital invested by the Central Government. As per the Separation Convention (on the recommendations of the Acworth Committee), 1924, the Railway Budget is presented to the Parliament by the Union Railway Minister, two days prior to the General Budget, usually around 26 February. Though the Railway Budget is separately presented to the Parliament, the figures relating to the receipt and expenditure of the Railways are also shown in the General Budget, since they are a part and parcel of the total receipts and expenditure of the Government of India. This document serves as a balance sheet of operations of the Railways during the previous year and lists out plans for expansion for the current year. The formation of policy and overall control of the railways is vested in Railway Board, comprising the Chairman, the Financial Commissioner and other functional members of Traffic, Engineering, Mechanical, Electrical and Staff departments. Indian Railways, which a few years ago was operating at a loss, has, in recent years, been generating positive cash flows and been meeting its dividend obligations to the government, with (unaudited) operating profits going up substantially.[49] The railway reported a cash surplus of 900 crore (US$179.6 million) in 2005, 14,000 crore (US$2.8 billion) in 2006, 20,000 crore (US$4 billion) in 2007 and 25,000 crore (US$5 billion) for the 20072008 fiscal year. Its operating ratio improved to 76% while, in the last four years, its plan size increased from 13,000 crore (US$2.6 billion) to 30,000 crore (US$6 billion). The proposed investment for the 20082009 fiscal year is 37,500 crore (US$7.5 billion), 21% more than for the previous fiscal year.[3] Budget Estimates2008 for Freight, Passenger, Sundry other Earnings and other Coaching Earnings have been kept at 52,700 crore (US$10.5 billion), 21,681 crore (US$4.3 billion), 5,000 crore (US$997.5 million) and 2,420 crore (US$482.8 million) respectively. Maintaining an overall double digit growth, Gross Traffic Earnings have been projected as 93,159 crore in 200910 (19.1 billion USD at current rate), exceeding the revised estimates for the current fiscal by 10,766 crore (US$2.1

billion).[3] Around 20% of the passenger revenue is earned from the upper class segments of the passenger segment (the air-conditioned classes).[50] The Sixth Pay Commission was constituted by the Government of India in 2005 to review the pay structure of government employees, and submitted its recommendations in April 2008. Based on its recommendations, the salaries of all Railways officers and staff were to be revised with retrospective effect w.e.f. 1 January 2006, resulting in an expenditure of over 13,000 crore (US$2.6 billion) in 200809 and 14,000 crore (US$2.8 billion) in 200910. Consequently, staff costs have risen from 44% of ordinary working expenses to 52%.

Pakistan Railways Funds and Budget:

The Pakistan Railways (PR) has become a white elephant for the nation. It has estimated a deficit of around Rs 53 billion for the fiscal year 2011-12 . The hard earned money of the nation which it pays in taxes so that the govt should provide them some facilities and comforts in life is being wasted ruthlessly by the govt on white elephant like Railway. Alas this organization could be run efficiently as we see it running in other countries, like India as an Example we saw. Chairman of National Assembly Standing Committee on Railways Sardar Ayyaz Sadiq told the media that the Railways had prepared a deficit budget for the fiscal year 2011-12. The deficit would be more than Rs 53 billion while earnings estimated at Rs 12 billion against an expenditure of Rs 65 billion. Pakistan Railways became the first federal ministry to have its annual budget rewritten by Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and his cabinet within six months of its budgets approval. After dragging its feet, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government finally gave in to the demands of senior railways officials and agreed to pay Rs8.1 billion to repair the locomotives and coaches, which were burnt in Karachi and Sukkur divisions in the aftermath of former premier Benazir Bhuttos assassination in 2007. Officials also revealed that the Pakistan Railways had lost Rs10 billion since July 2010. They had also brought a new financial bailout package of Rs11.2 billion to the meeting and a demand to revise their annual estimated budget from Rs50 billion to Rs61.2. The officials, giving a breakdown of the Rs11.2 billion bailout plan, said that Rs6.1 billion were required to rehabilitate locomotives, Rs2 billion each for deferred maintenance of tracks and coaches and Rs1 billion to create strategic oil reserves. The Pakistani officials said that the reason for the financial collapse was a constantly declining revenue stream, which was caused by several factors. A failure to secure supply of spare parts for Chinese locomotives was cited as one of them. Also, officials said, railways did not get the 75 new Chinese locomotives and tariff was not increased. They said that railways was yet to receive the amount to repair locomotives that were burnt in 2007 and the closure of three routes Peshawar

to Nowshera, Kot Addu to Multan and Shikarpur to Quetta due to floods caused further revenue shortfall.

Financial crisis in Pakistan Railways:

MISSION STATEMENT of Pakistan railway is To provide a competitive, safe, reliable, market oriented, efficient and environment-friendly mode of transport. But lets see what they have done under the light of their mission statement.

The Ministry of Finance has asked the State Bank of Pakistan to hold the release of salaries and other payments Pakistan Railways causing further chaos ( ) in a department marred by corruption and irregularities. The present financial crisis under which the PR is not able to release salaries of thousands of employees and make payments for fuel consumed by passenger and freight trains is due to the holding of financial matters by the ministry. For the first time, Railway has to make the payment of salaries through cash earnings in various divisions after severe protest by its employees who had not received their salaries for over 15 days.

The divisional administration, disbursed the salaries of staffs of various categories on July 15, 16 and 17 through stopping the submission of cash earnings in National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) for three days. This situation has never happened in the railways because before the SBP released salaries and other payments even if the amount in the railways account was temporarily not sufficient, they said. They also added that after the instruction of the ministry of finance that SBP will release the fund only if the railways account has the required amount of money, salaries and other payment have been severely disrupted. Minister for Railways Ghulam Ahmed Bilour, has warned that PR has only two days oil reserves to run passenger and goods trains. A cheque issued by the railways to Pakistan State Oil (PSO) has bounced and according to a letter sent by PSO to the Section Officer Finance Division Islamabad, on Tuesday, the total outstanding dues of PR to oil marketing company as on July 19, 2011, was Rs1.091 billion. According to the letter, four cheques issued to PSO on July 5 and 8, amounting to Rs297.157 million were yet to be cleared. While PSO has supplied 3.2 million Litres, High Speed Diesel and 40,000 Litres Kerosone Oil this month. Pakistan Railways suffered Rs.26,252.315 million losses during the year 2010-11 mainly due to non-rehabilitation of tracks and out of order locomotives. According to a Ministry official, the Ministry has taken numerous steps for rehabilitation and development of Pakistan Railways during the year 2011-12 however, these are subject to provision of funds from international and national financial institutions.

Steps for the improvement of Pakistan railways:

China is actively involved in the development of Pakistan Railways and for the past five years it has been increasing its stake in the country's communication sector. Pakistan Railways carries 65 million passengers annually and operates 228 mail, express and passenger trains daily. It introduced new mail and express trains between major terminals from 2003 to 2005. Pakistan Railways has recently entered several agreements with Chinese railway companies for its development. In 2001, Pakistan Railways signed a $91.89 million contract with China National Machinery Import and Export Corp for the manufacture of 175 new high-speed passenger coaches. The project was funded by Exim Bank China on a supplier credit basis. Forty completely built passenger coaches have been received and 105 will be assembled in Pakistan Railways' carriage factory by next December. These coaches are being used on Pakistan Railways' mail and express trains from RawalpindiLahore-Karachi, Lahore-Faisalabad and Rawalpindi-Quetta. The manufacturing kits for the remaining 30 coaches have also been received and manufacturing is in progress. With 12 already assembled, the project is scheduled to be completed by next month. The passenger coaches are of the latest design and are equipped with disc brakes.

Under an agreement signed with China in 2003, Pakistan Railways purchased 69 locomotives, of which 15 were delivered as completely built units and are in use by Pakistan Railways. The remaining 54 are to be built at Pakistan Railways' locomotive factory. The Chinese locomotives are 37% cheaper than the European locomotives. Some in Pakistan have been criticizing the faulty locomotives purchased by Pakistan Railways from Dong Fang Electric Corp of China. It is surprising that last year, Pakistan Railways decided to purchase 45 more 2,000-3,000-horsepower locomotives from the same company. The company is willing to redesign the already-delivered 30 locomotives of the original order, such that the underframe is strengthened and the weight reduced to less than 140 tons. Last year, as a result of an open bidding, a Chinese company, Beijing Research and Design Institute, is committed to providing 300 rail cars to Pakistan Railways. Pakistan signed a series of agreements with China during the past three years to enhance the capability of its railway system. Under an agreement signed between Pakistan and China Railway, a Chinese company will provide 1,300 freight cars to Pakistan Railways, of which 420 will be manufactured in China and the remaining 880 will be produced at the Moghalpura railway workshops in Lahore. Under another project, 450 passenger coaches will be rehabilitated at an estimated cost of Rs2.14 billion.. As part of a $100 million agreement signed between Pakistan and China in November 2001, China is to export 69 modern locomotive engines to Pakistan to modernize Pakistan's railway fleet. The first eight engines have been completed and are ready for shipment to Karachi. The new engines consume less fuel than older models and are cheaper to maintain. The main feature of this deal is that the first 15 engines will be manufactured in China and the remainder will be assembled in Pakistan, with spare parts and technology provided by China. Similarly, for a Rs7.2 billion railway project in Sindh province involving laying 78,000 tons of rails, China delivered 64,000 tons to Pakistan Railways. Computerized on-line reservation system has been introduced on the Pakistan Railways system. So far 42 stations have been computerized; 10 more stations are planned during current fiscal year. Pakistan Railways has faced severe financial and Management Crisis under the minister ship of Mr. Bilor. In those circumstances the Department has shake hand with Private Operators. In this pursuit Pakistan Railway has started several trains on Public-Private Partnership. Pakistan Business Express Train commenced its maiden Journey on February 3. 2012 and Shalimar Express resumed its operation on February 25, 201.

References:
1 http://pkeconomists.com

2 http://en.wikipedia.org 3 http://indianrailways.gov.in