SDG'S and Pakistan

 Pakistan ranked 129 out of 165 country in a recent sustainable development goals SDG'S  index ranking the country saw moderate improvement in the goals for poverty health and well being water and sanitation decent work, peace and Justice partnerships but it stagnated on zero hunger quality education gender in equality Clean Energy innovation sustainable cities and community the UN in Pakistan has been Supporting Pakistan in various except of its endeavor to realise SDG'S  UN is contributing in technology and policies in Pakistan to achieve SDG'S  the Pakistan and UN in Pakistan signed the UN sustainable development Framework also known as one unit one Nation program Pakistan is affirmed it's commitment to the 2030 agenda for sustainable development by adopting SDG'S  as its own National development agenda through  national assembly resolution 2016 in Pakistan SDG'S  support unit have been established at federal and provisional level with planning institutions to guide SDG'S  implementation and monitoring progress. in 2018 the government designed and approved our national SDG'S  Framework that envisages our national vision to priorities and localise SDG'S  localised provincial SDG frame works are being formulated the focus of the government is on main streaming SDG'S  in Planning process ensuring through monitoring and reporting on SDG'S  insurance public financial allocation are aligned to SDG'S  and  alternate financing modalities are being explored and  to benefit from use of technology to accelerate progress towards SDG'S 

In global gender gap index Pakistan was ranked 153 in 2021 in Human Development Index Pakistan rank 154th in 2021 the 38% of Pakistan population living with multi dimensional poverty Pakistan has an estimate population of over 220 million in 2021 and growth rate of 1.95percent per year adding 5.28 million people per year to it is population it is projected to surpass indonesians in size around the year 2048

In education sector the quality of education and employability of school graduate is very low and the growing young population as little to no access to quality schooling, the literacy rate remain abysmal at 59% specially female literacy. Pakistan is also facing an Energy Crisis this is not a recent issue both domestic and industry users have suffered power shortage and blackout for years. in 2012, in Faisalabad the textile industry hub 68 unit went into closure resulting in 1 million unemployed labour and a loss of  billions annually between 2010 and 2013 hurting the sector that contribute 9.8% of total GDP at accounts for 39% of total employment Pakistan also has one of the highest rate of urbanization in South Asia urban area have expanded immensely between 1995 and 2015 the various Urban Sector convert 3016 hectares of agriculture land annually for urban use in Metropolitan Lahore and if this rate does not slow by 2030 all agriculture land at the fringes of cities will be urbanized beyond this challenges Pakistan has major water shortage it is rank 14th out of 150 countries at high raise of water crisis it is noted that 17 million people in Pakistan lack access to clean water at home and 70 million lack access to a decent toilet

despite growth in income inflation remain above 6% rising the cost of staples and even in the face of high unemployment rate of 16% amount the educated middle class in 2018 to 2019 and increase wealth inequality the world food program say that 21% of Pakistan population is malnourished 44% of children under 5 year old have stunted growth and 37% of population faces food in security despite Pakistan being a major producer of wheat and rice

The sustainable development report 2021 has released and hotly debate among policy circles Pakistan with an overall index score in 2021 of 57.7 means that the country is on average 57.7% on the way to the best possible outcomes across the 17 SDG'S  this score is 1.5% higher than the country score in 2020 Pakistan is categorised in the east and South Asia region that comprises 21 countries including China and Singapore pushing the regional score upward compare 220 Pakistan performance has increased by 3% in the region.despite the covid-19 Global push back Pakistan SDG Global rank is 129 in 2021 improved by 5 ranks 134 in 2020 compare to its neighbours Bangladesh ranks stayed at 109 during 2020 and 2021 India rank decline by 3 from 117 to 120 between 2020 and 2021

population with access to clean fuel and Technology for cooking SDG indicators 7.1.2 has been reported 43.3% in 2016 according to latest National data source the population with the access to clean fuel and Technology for cooking increase by 5.7%  2015– 2019 and stand at 47% in 2019 – 2020 according to the Pakistan Bureau of statics covid-19 specified survey (2020) 27.31 million working population was affected related to SDG 1no poverty and SDG2 no hunger and SDG 8 on decent work and economic growth 20.6 million people could not work during the first wave of pendemic. in 2020 6.7 million peoples income was declined 74% of the informal workers were affected the government came up with an 1.24 trillion stimulus package to boost over all economic situation as specially in the bid to reduce the impact of covid-19 on  poverty SDG1 hunger SDG 2 health SDG 3 and SDG 8 on decent work and economic growth

Pakistan like other developing countries faces huge fiscal challenges to meet SDG'S  this has been also acknowledge in the sustainability report 2021 according to an International Monetary Fund study 2021 on the costing of SDG'S  related to education health and physical capital electricity road  water and sanitation additional annual spending of about 60% of GDP will be required until 2030 from the public and private sector combined to help these SDG'S  

NPM

Public sector reform can defined in many ways but common element in defination of public sector reform are

• Deliberate planned change to public bureaucracies
• It's synonyms with innovation
• Improvement In public services efficiency and effectiveness are the intended outcome of the reform process 
• The urgency of reform is justified by the need to cope with the uncertainties and rapid changes taking place in the organizational environment

The public sector reform knows under the rubric of NPM were deliberate changes set in motion by newly elected neo conservation gov that were determined to change the public bureaucracy and remove what they saw as obstacles to efficient service delivery

NPM was first introduced by the Thatcher government in Britain but also in the United States and countries like Australia and new Zealand

NPM principle were also applied in many third world countries as a condition for loan set by the international financial institution many different type of reform measures have been group under the label of NPM

The transfer of private sector management principle to the public sector 

Introducing private sector management into the public sector has been referred to as the managerialism its stresses hand on professional management explicit standard and measures of performers managing by results and value for money it is offered referred to as the three Es of economy efficiency and effective. the focus on results reflect the criticism above that there was too much slack or waste in public sector instead of allocating money to the Agencies without consulting the actual services provided budgets where to be created on the basis of output for example the most student that graduate the more money to the school this is also called output budgeting another issue here is performance pay, public employees should be promoted and remunerated according to their performance rather than according to the number of year in office critical voice have argued that it is impossible to measure performance in public sector but the principle of performance Pay and output budgeting have sneaked into many Reform programs

Private sector management principle all so found their way into the Reform agenda of many third world government mainly because these principal had been adopted by economist in international financial institution such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund

Privatization

Privatisation simply mean the selling or transfer of public sector enterprises to private ownership the underlining philosophy is that the privile sector can take care of many functions more efficiently than the state so privatisation aims at increasing efficiency reducing cost to consumer and reducing public sector expenditure Britain thatcher government was the four univer introducing for reaching privateisation program that result it in the privatization of nationally all amines the Postal Services the National Railway and other large on organisation

Another Miller version of privatization is the system of contracting out this means that the state remains the buyer of the services but the services itself is undertaken by a Private agency the state as purchaser the private sector as provider example of function that could be released aur contracted out to the Pravesh sector are garbage collection cleaning in Public School Universities and hospital and water supply scheme the more radical country such as the United Kingdom have contracted out services that that have traditionally been considered as the core of states such as prison services and security

Third world government also undertook privatisation which was often posited as a condition for acquiring loans from the IMF and the World Bank public sector enterprises in developing countries had open served as a way to provide patronage person whose political loyalty was important for appointed by the president as as a director of the Enterprise rather than person who were the best qualified through privatisation this means of patronage were removed between 1988 and 1993 for example over 2700 public enterprises in more than 60 developing countries what transfer to private ownership the poster communist country also launched comprehensive privateisation programs

Agnification

Agency vacation refer to the establishment of semi autonomous Agencies possible for operational management the keyn ocean is distance from the central department so there is freedom of manage this is Principal dried from the traditional modern idea of separating politics and session the logic is dead by operating these from political pressure it can be run more efficiently agnification mean that implementation become more distinct from policy making because the agency explicit t guidelines are to implement policy already decided by government

Competition

Another element in the new public and management is time exercising competition as an instrument to enhance efficiency introducing competition can be done through permittization were the state Monopoly is dismantle but it can also be done throw the introducing of quasi markets into the public sector 5 temple in health were citizen are allowed to shop for the best provided by the choosing prely among hospital and Prakriti nurse this can be done by supplying people with voucher that they can use whether they please for example in debate about racial integration of American school the introduction of school voucher have been suggest so that parents can choose where to spend education money the school allow them much greater choice then in current system where force Beijing of children in name of decoration have been much criticize

PEF regional office Rwp, visit

On 22 April 2022 the student of bs 6 PA&G numl GPP DEPT visit the regional office of Punjab Education Foundation location Sir Syed Ave, Phase 5 Gulrez Housing Scheme, Rawalpindi, Punjab the team had a good fruitful meeting and interactive discussion with director regional office Naveed Akhtar

The following were the objective of meeting with director regional office;

To discuss the background Punjab Education Foundation

To discuss the mission and vision of Punjab Education Foundation and the step taken to achieve those missions and vision

To discuss the functions of Punjab Education Foundation

To discuss the kind of schools of Punjab Education Foundation are working

To discuss how teacher were train under continuous profession and development program

To compare the PEF with other education institute

To discuss reports and performance of Punjab Education Foundation

To discuss the management of Punjab Education Foundation

To discuss the public private partnership importance for the development of Pakistan 

To discuss the Punjab Education Foundation monitoring and evolution system

To discuss the budget and finance model of PEF

To discuss the future initiative of Punjab Education Foundation

Outcomes of meeting

The Punjab Education Foundation used to provide loan to NGOs to sustain education the Punjab Education Foundation was established in 1991 through an act of provincial assembly of Punjab in 2004 Punjab Education Foundation was restructure the main purpose was to provide education in urban slum remote area and area where there are no school and school under performance. Pakistan has the second largest population of out of school children in world this population make up of 22.8 million children being out of school in Pakistan who are between 5 and 16 this also mean that 44% of population of Pakistan in this group is out of school around 2.6 million student get free and quality education under punjab education foundation. Providing the free education from Punjab Education Foundation is the financial support to the parents and it motivate them to send their children to school for the education it is very beneficial and helpful for the labour class in Pakistan. the Punjab Education Foundation have 7468 partner School, for the collaboration with Punjab Education Foundation the partner school have to show 75% result. on discussion with director regional office he told that the school having partnership with Punjab Education Foundation the student are studying free of cost and not pay their fees for education and they were also provided by free text books if Rule were broken by any of partner school or  take money from students in any way they will be fine 50% of their allocated budget and on next charge the PEF will cancel the membership of particular School the Punjab Education Foundation use sis student information system for verified endowment the student of different schools public and private running with the partnership of Punjab Education Foundation their data is available on sis and updated time by time no fake induction of student is possible the data of student and parents were also check from Nada integrated system the director regional office sad that the finance and budget of Punjab Education is from the people and it is for the people the Punjab Education Foundation is very conscious on the spending of money and take all measures while spending the money and the team of Punjab Education time but time inspect and monitor the departments and partner School to check the proper use of budget to reduce the corrupt practices and corruption on asking from director regional office Naveed Akhtar that why Punjab Education Foundation is a successful institution in Pakistan on the reply of this question he said that the only reason for the success of Punjab Education is monitoring and evolution system there is no compensate on breaking of rules and regulation of Punjab Education Foundation Strictly rules were followed the Punjab Education Foundation keep the eye on the partners Schools and also inspect and monitor twice in a year

Remarks and conclusion 

Education is the building block of a country to meet modern day challenging beside developing the youth as future leader in the 21st century when change is the only constant provision of quality education to every children become all the more important to create knowledge base society to promote innovation is the cornerstone of the development the role of Punjab Education Foundation in complimenting education department efforts to bring each children in a school is commendable Punjab Education Foundation board and its management deserve appreciation for success for steering this mega PPP venture, meant to deliver a public good guaranteed in the constitution wish that the provisional government will continue the support Punjab Education in its endeavors to deliver quality education all across the province particular to under served community of far flung and less developed areas

BS 6 PA&G DEPT GPP 

Group members 

Malik zeewaqar ahmed 

Hasan raza khan

Sajid bishal

Madiha zaman

The Real Evil

syeda mahnoor ali (bs-6th)  

Karachi being the biggest city of Pakistan is over populated. The population of “the city of lights” was about 14.91 million in 2017. Pakistan being a developing country, has a better urban system than rural. Explaining the reason why most of the rural population comes to urban cities to find employment and better social facilities to attain better standards of living. Many of the institutions of society are lacking in rural areas of Pakistan such as educational, medicinal, employment and recreational etc. The population growth is affecting the city of Karachi more than any part of Pakistan.  However, there are many other factors affecting population growth other than migration from rural to urban.  High birth rate and low death rate play an important role in population growth as well, ultimately affecting the economy of Pakistan. The excessive amount of resources in accordance with the population is what makes a country developed, stable and advanced however Pakistan has a way larger population than its resources.

We have seen many contradictions in society about population and economy/resources over time. Let’s take china for example Chinese leader Mao Xi Dong quotes that “it’s the people not the things that are decisive”. Mao believed that if each and every person works hard and roots out selfishness from his heart to work for his country then the economy will improve itself.

One the other hand we see that china itself implemented a one child policy which resulted in preventing 400 million births and a drastic increase in economy. So we come to a conclusion that over population or population expansion is an enormous issue all over the world and not only in Pakistan.

 If Pakistan wants to improve its economy and enter the privilege of being a developed and powerful country, it will have to control its population. There are many ways by which population can be controlled, the best way is education. not only in Pakistan but in all the third world countries, we come across this disturbing fact that the rich and affluent have lesser amount of children than the poor and lacking.

The condition of Karachi is being destroyed due to over population. All sorts of evils and crimes are being committed due to anonymity and the standard of living of people is declining day by day. If the situation stays the same or worsens, it is not far away when the poor will rage a war against the rich.

Webinar: Need of Career counseling in Pakistani Education system

"Find out what you like doing best, and get someone to pay you for doing it"

A webinar session in the context of Public sector reforms and social change supervised by Dr. Athar Rashid was organised by a group of students of Governance and Public Policy Department on the topic "NEED OF CAREER COUNSELING IN PAKISTANI EDUCATION SYSTEM" on 27th April 2022.The session was presided over by respected Mr. GULFAM AKRAM. He's a civil engineer form UET, Post graduate in Public administration, Working as Sub-divisional officer (BPS-17) at Govt.of Punjab, Communication &Work department and a well known entrepreneur and a philanthropist.

The webinar was organized with the objective to spread the awareness on importance of choosing the right career path in Pakistani education system. Stream selection is an important milestone in the career planning stage and different parameters are crucial to evaluate before choosing the respective stream. Career options available for each stream were discussed in discussion.

The speaker informed about the importance of career counseling and the challenges that are faced while deciding the career in Pakistan. Considerations such as parent’s preferences, economic resources, peer pressure and career trend were also discussed. Now a days in Pakistan the talented youth is facing frustration and numerous challenges with respect to unemployment and uncertainty. Situation is moving on that there is nothing to see as right person for right job. Employment is very much difficult in the country like Pakistan, where unemployment is strengthening its foundation and will continue to get even worse so it is very crucial to opt for the career which is to grow further and which has the flexibility to get it bigger.The key purpose of career counseling is to help out students for choosing a field that is in tune with their skills and their job expectations. Thus, with the help of career counseling, most candidates choose the right career, and perform their level best, which ultimately helps them to succeed. 

Speaker addressed that in Pakistan, career counseling is very important as this soil has a abundance of talent and starting it from grass root level, is an ultimate need. The need of career counseling in educational setting can be promoted through conducted various seminars, workshops catering both parents and students and counseling departments should be encouraged in every institute so that students should clearly define the paths they wanted to be in and a properly guided individual can flourish more than an individual with an unclear mind.

To conclude, We can say that the crux of career counseling in Pakistan is to provide the necessary guidance that would help the student in making the right choice regarding their career.In this situation, seeking the help of an experienced and qualified career counselor become necessary. He /she can assist you in discovering your potential and aptitude accordingly in order to suggest the right course.People have begun to realize the fact that not all can become engineers or doctors and started exploring other fields depending on their talent and interest in alternate domains.

This session was proved very beneficial for the attendees. It was a very enlightening experience for the students and the webinar ended on a successful note.

Organizers: 

Ayesha Abbasi (Host), Arbaz Khan, Bilal Akram , Barkha Khan

GPP Department

Numl Islamabad

 

Purpose of Education for any Nation || Education Sector of Pakistan

 This Blog is Covering the following topics

Why New Policies are  Made Time to Time in Pakistan

Role Of Education in Developing Countries

Definition Of Education Planning

Definition Of Education Policy 

Why it is Important for Pakistan to have an Effective Education Policy

Education System in Pakistan

Education System and MDGS Goals

 

If We discuss about the education policy of Pakistan from the day of independence 1947  Pakistan cant able to make a sustainable education policy  after some years the education policy changes so if there was not a sustainable education policy then how can we believe that there will be progress in education sector. Tell 1970 we don’t have any concrete education policy

·         1970 = First Education policy

·         1972 = Second  Education policy

·         1979 = Third Education policy

·         1992 = Fourth Education policy

·         1998 = Fifth Education policy

·         2010 = Sixth Education policy

·         2011 = Seventh Education policy

·         2021 = Eighth Education Policy

This is the long history of Pakistan Education policy and its still going so the biggest reason of these ups and downs is political instability and economic instability  but some other issues are as below,

1)      Lack of Proper Planning

2)      Social constraints 

3)      Gender gap

4)      Cost of education

5)      War on Terror

6)      Funds for Education

7)      Technical Education

The education and development go hand in hand. The Role of education in developing countries is a very important  and its importance increases in country like Pakistan. One as lack of education causes poverty and slow economic development of a country especially if the country is a developing country. Education is very important for everyone it’s a primary need of any individual, every girl or boy child should have the right to quality education so that they can have better chances in life, including employment opportunities, and better health.

The role of education in poverty reduction is huge. Some advantages of education are

·        It boosts economic growth

·        Increases the GDP of a country.  

·        Reduces infant mortality rate, 

·        Increases human life expectancy. 

Education is an important investment in a country as there are huge benefits. Education guarantees lifetime income; it promotes peace and reduces drop-out rates from schools and colleges and encourages healthy competition. Many children dropout form colleges as they are not aware of the advantages of college education. Education helps in making the right decisions at the time of conflicts.

Definition of Education Planning

Educational planning is Defined as  it is the application of rational, systematic analysis to the process of educational development with the aim of making education more effective and efficient in responding to the needs and goals of its students and society.

Definition of Education Policy

Every country has their own education policy according to their country issues. If we try to define the education policy it  consists of the principles and government policies in the educational sphere as well as the collection of laws and rules that govern the operation of education systems. Education occurs in many forms for many purposes through many institutions. Some Examples include early childhood education, kindergarten through to 12th grade, two and four year colleges or universities, graduate and professional education, adult education and job training. Therefore, education policy can directly affect the education people engage in at all ages. Examples of areas subject to debate in education policy, specifically from the field of schools, include school size, class size, school choice, school privatization, tracking, teacher selection, education and certification, teacher pay, teaching methods, curricular content, graduation requirements, school infrastructure investment, and the values that schools are expected to uphold and model. Issues in education policy also address problems within higher education. 

Why it is important for Pakistan to have an effective education policy

There is a serious need of education policy because The education system of Pakistan is comprised of

·    260,903 institutions and is facilitating 41,018,384 students with the help of 1,535,461 teachers.

·        180,846 public institutions

·        80,057 private institutions.

And  31% educational institutes are run by private sector while 69% are public institutes. 

That’s why we need a concrete and permanent education policy which will define our students and youth future direction.

Education system in Pakistan

The education sector not have been any attention of any of the government of Pakistan after independence 1947 tell 1970 we don’t have any concrete education policy which can define our course of action in education sector which is very important for the progress of Pakistan unfortunately the political and military leaders were interested in political gain and power gain so due to which our education sector lake behind but now due to international campaigns about education Pakistan is try to made little improvement in education sector not much but little changes are been made from last decades.

Pakistan has expressed its commitment to promote education and literacy in the country by education policies at domestic level and getting involved into international commitments on education. In this regard national education policies are the visions which suggest strategies to increase literacy rate, capacity building, and enhance facilities in the schools and educational institutes. MDGs and EFA programmes are global commitments of Pakistan for the promotion of literacy. A review of the education system of Pakistan suggests that there has been little change in Pakistan’s schools since 2010, when the 18th Amendment enshrined education as a fundamental human right in the constitution.

·        Problems of access,

·        Quality,

·        Infrastructure,

·        Inequality of opportunity.

Education policy in Pakistan and SDGS / MDGS  

   MDGs and Pakistan

Due to the problems in education system of Pakistan, the country is lagging behind in achieving its MDGs of education. The MDGs have laid down two goals for education sector:

Goal 2 Universal Primary Education

The goal 2 of MDGs is to achieve Universal Primary Education (UPE), children everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling. The enrolment statistics show an increase in the enrolment of students of the age of 3-16 year while dropout rate decreased. But the need for increasing enrolment of students remains high to achieve MDGs target. Punjab is leading province wise in net primary enrolment rate with 62% enrolment. The enrolment rate in Sindh province is 52%, in Khyber Pakhtunkhawa (KPK) 54% and primary enrolment rate in Balochistan is 45%.

 

Goal 3 Promoting Gender Equality and Women Empowerment

 The goal 3 of MDGs is Promoting Gender Equality and Women Empowerment. It is aimed at eliminating gender disparity in primary and secondary education by 2005 and in all levels of education . There is a stark disparity between male and female literacy rates. The national literacy rate of male was 71% while that of female was 48% . Provinces reported the same gender disparity. Punjab literacy rate in male was 71% and for females it was 54%. In Sindh literacy rate in male was 72% and female 47%, in KPK male 70% and females 35%, while in Balochistan male 62% and female 23%

 

Pakistan’s ranking on Human Development Index (HDI)

 Pakistan’s ranking on Human Development Index (HDI) fell two notches and stood at 154th position in accordance with the 2020 report out of total 189 countries.

 

 

Suggestions  or Recommendations

·        Balanced approach for formal and informal education be adopted.

·        Government must take action against ghost schools

·        Implement single national curriculum in all provinces

·         Increases numbers of Vocational and technical training institutes

·        There is a need for implementation of national education policy and vision 2030 education goals.

·        Public private partnership is also future need

 

 

Thanks for reading

Written by = Yasir Hassan || G&pp || Bs 6^th

 

COMPARISON OF INDIAN RAILWAY WITH PAKISTAN'S RAILWAY

COMPARISON OF PAKISTAN'S RAILWAY WITH INDIAN RAILWAY

It   has become quite fashionable in Pakistan to compare every sector of the country with its respective Indian counterpart and start lamenting that every state institution in Pakistan is woefully deficient in terms of service delivery, profitability, efficiency, customer satisfaction etc., while everything is far better in every institution of India. Presently, Pakistan Railways is one such institution under spotlight. Everyone is comparing its performance with that of the Indian Railways without understanding that any comparison between these two institutions is a meaningless exercise because of their different colonial legacies, different historical evolution, different market environments and the extremely different governance structures under which they respectively operate.

Before proceeding further, let me first dispel the myth about the huge profits being earned by the Indian Railways. No railway in the world is in profit; it is never meant to be. They are not built for purely commercial purposes; they have multiple objectives in which profitability no doubt plays a key role but not a very significant one. That is why, even after privatisation in major European countries, not only the infrastructural development of the railway networks lies with the state, huge subsidies are being paid to the private sector operating those trains which are unable to earn profits.

Indian Railways is no exception. After the amalgamation of separate budget of the Indian Railways with the Union Budget in 2016 (Pakistan did it in 1992), Indian Railways have not published its operating ratio- the amount it spends to earn each dollar/pound/rupee. However, it used to be around 95. In other words, it earns 100 rupees for every 95 rupees spent. Pretty profitable? Unfortunately, no. If you deduct the Indian Rupees 30,000 crores of Public Service Obligations payments made by the Indian government to the Indian Railways to operate those services which are commercially not profitable but had to be kept operational due to their strategic or social welfare objectives, this ratio will be above 100. After the merger of the Indian Railways Budget with the Union Budget, they are debating whether to call these payments-subsidy or PSO payments!

On the other hand, Pakistan railways do not enjoy facility of Public Service Obligations payments. Profitable or not, it must run a train which used to run in 1947.When restructuring the Pakistan Railways in 1990s, it was recommended that if the state was interested to continue running of strategically or politically important loss-making trains, then it should compensate the Pakistan Railways for the loss incurred on its operation. These PSO payments were made to the Pakistan Railways for two years but were discontinued due to lack of funds. Instead it pays subsidy to the Pakistan Railways

Now coming to the main question- Can we make a meaningful comparison between Pakistan Railways and its Indian counterpart? Simple answer is no; complex answer is it depends. Let me explain

British Imperialism, like any other imperialism before, was an exploitative one for which they developed an extensive infrastructure to achieve their strategic and commercial interests. As luck would have been, India which inherited more than 80% of their vast rail network got the best of the British Indian Railways, not only commercially viable rail services but also its vast manufacturing capability and huge pool of trained workforce. As only their branch lines were cut off because of the creation of Pakistan, Indian Railways could keep bulk of their train operational in the rest of the country

On the other hand, Pakistan, which was carved out of the provinces situated in the outer periphery of the vast British Indian Empire, got the bulk of the railway built by the British to achieve their strategic and geopolitical objectives in these outlying areas. They were meant for easy and rapid movement of troops and their families and transportation of war material to these areas, not for general passenger travel.

Being branch lines and built for strategic purposes, all the rail network with the sole exception of Lahore to Karachi route inherited by Pakistan was commercially non-profitable from the start. Severance of these branch-line connections from their main arteries in the wake of the partition of the Subcontinent, made them totally non-profitable. Pakistan Railways kept these lines operational mainly by utilising its profits from the few profit-making routs for operating loss -making trains. This cross subsidization helped it to provide facilities to the public for transportation of goods and commutation of passengers in the absence of roads in the far-flung areas of the country.

However, this cross -subsidization soon ran out of steam. While all the profit earned from commercially viable train operations was eaten up in running the loss-making trains, the profit-making rail services started losing their profitability in the face of tough competition from fast improving road network and transport discussed below.

After independence, India and Pakistan both embarked on planned development in which infrastructural development, with special emphasis on expanding the communication network, was the key priority Here both the countries opted for different policies. In the absence of a comprehensive transport policy which would have given the direction to the transport sector and had also encouraged private sector to come forward, in a mutually consistent and competitively neutral way, Pakistan preferred roads which got more funding than other three modes of transport i.e. rail, aviation and marine.

Being geographically smaller in size, Pakistan could extend its road network substantially. Over a period, a robust private transport sector emerged which could ply buses, trucks on these improved roads. Consequently, in the overall national transport perspective, instead of a national multi-modal transport network, there was an unnecessary competition between these two modes of transportation. As railways got a step motherly treatment in the allocation of funds for their operations, maintenance and improvement and construction of new networks, it was an unequal fight.

India, on the other hand, opted for improvement and expansion of rail network, a priority dictated by the political and strategic imperatives of keeping a continent-size country together than any profit motive. Indian Railways, therefore, got generous funding from the government as compared with the road which is still far from satisfactory in India. Indian Railways is lucky in another sense-four of their ministers later became the prime ministers of the country and always had a patronising attitude towards railway.  Even in the latest budget the present Indian leadership has tried to strengthen this institution and announced an initiative of us $137 billion investment in Indian railways.

Thus, comparing a strategic railway with a commercial one based on profitability is as inappropriate as comparing Pakistan road transport with Indian counterpart; both have evolved over a period under different sets of policies and priorities. That’s why running of trains in remote regions of India is still a viable option; doing the same in Pakistan is a recipe for disaster for the balance sheet of Pakistan Railways

Thirdly, it is the operational autonomy and financial independence of the Indian Railways which makes it possible to rationalise its operational policies and priorities in accordance with the changing economic conditions. Terminating loss making trains aside, Pakistan Railways cannot increase the railway fares even when the price of fuel skyrockets. Similarly, the degree of political interference in the operations of Pakistan Railways is far more than it is in case of Indian Railways. For example, while the Indian Railways can afford to disallow uneconomical train stoppages howsoever strong the political pressure may be, in Pakistan, having train stoppages, whether economically justified or not, is considered to be a prerogative of a political leader in his constituency.

Finally, it is the economies of scale which play a decisive role in determining the profitability or loss of a commercial venture. The bigger the size, the greater savings on fixed costs-simple and straight forward.  Indian Railways is one of the world’s largest railway networks comprising 115,000 km of track over a route of 65,808 km and 7,112 stations. Employing more than 1.3 million persons and operating in twenty-nine states and seven union territories, it carries around 9 billion passengers annually or more than 23 million passengers a day and more than 1000 million tons of freight per year. Running more than 12,600 passengers and around 7400 freight trains daily, Indian Railways earns approximately US$25 billion every year. In the presence of above mentioned facts and figures, any comparison between Indian Railways with that of Pakistan Railways is meaningless

So, what has happened to Pakistan Railways? Simple answer? Underfunding. It is the same old business principle-you earn if you invest and you earn more if you invest more. Noam Chomsky has rightly remarked “If you want to privatise something for pittance, first reduce its state funding, it will go in loss, and then sell it for a pittance”. That’s precisely what has happened to Pakistan Railways.

Since 1990s, every government, civilian or military, has been trying to privatise the Pakistan Railways and considered investing in an entity meant for privatisation as a sheer wastage of resources. This underinvestment has taken a heavy toll of the commercial viability of Pakistan Railways. No doubt they are running into losses, a perfect justification for their privatisation!

The honourable Chief Justice of Pakistan credited Lalu Parsad, former Minister for Indian Railways presently serving jail term for corruption, with “marvellous turnaround of Indian Railways despite not being a highly educated person”. (He is an LLB). Well, the truth is that it was Lalu Parsad’s sheer good luck that he became the minister for Indian Railways at a time when the two decades of consistent and massive investment made by his four illustrious predecessors in the Indian Railways had started bearing fruit. Even then, he fudged the figures by showing employee’s provident fund as an asset instead of liability. Just read the latest report of Indian Auditor General to know how he did the window dressing to show Indian Railways’ Profit & Loss Statement in black.