‘Govt to hire consultant for railways ML-1 project design’

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Planning Asad Umar said the government decided to hire international consultant for scrutinizing detailed engineering design of multibillion dollars Mainline (ML-1) project under China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).

Before granting final approval of the project, the government wants to accomplish its spadework free of any flaws, he said. The international consultant, he said, will also be assigned to gauge the capacity of Railways’ management to operate this project after getting modernization of mainline from Peshawar to Karachi with massive investments of approximately $9.2 billion.

“We have decided to hire international consultant to scrutinize detailed engineering design that has been accomplished recently. The execution on ML-1 project will start from the next financial year as the government wants to ensure front planning of multibillion dollar project without committing any flaws at this stage”, Federal Minister for Planning Asad Umar told The News in an exclusive talk at his ministerial office on Tuesday.

In his first exclusive interaction with The News after assuming charge of Minister of Planning, Development, Reforms and Special Initiatives, Asad Umar said that the Planning Commission had decided to grant approval of PC-1 of ML-1 after completion of detailed engineering design of the project. Now the detailed engineering design was completed, the government decided to hire international consultant with the mandate to gauge the capacity of operating modernized railway after making huge investments.

He said the cost of modernising railway under ML-1 already went up by $1 billion from $8.2 billion to $9.2 billion so firm up at planning stage would help to execute this huge project.

To another query regarding execution of ML-1 when the country was under the IMF programme, Asad Umar replied that the debt sustainability was ensured for execution of ML-1 project as the purpose of making flaw free plan was to convert this project commercially viable.

The consultant, he said, would take four to five months to scrutinize ML-1 project in totality. After doing this spadework the PC-1 of ML-1 will be approved by different relevant forums, he added.

The minister said that financing of ML-1 would be discussed with China after completion of all procedural requirements as well thought out planning at front stage would help to execute such an important project in smooth manner.

Meanwhile, the sources said that China indicated to execute this project in EPC mode as they were not ready to undertake this project on BOT (Built-Operate and Transfer) basis.