Thirty-four locomotive engines worth Rs1.5 billion are being manufactured at the Mughalpura railway workshop in Lahore by Pakistan Railways (PR) and Chinese mechanical engineers.
Around three locomotives are being manufactured each month until all of them are set to be rolled out by next year, sources said. Instead of importing the engines, which would have come at a cost of Rs15 billion, the railways are building three locomotives each month.
The engines will operate on the Lahore, Rawalpindi, Karachi, and Quetta routes.
It is expected that the engines will be used for freight and passenger trains for the next 11 years.
All these locomotive engines were imported from China in 2014 and a contract was signed with the Chinese company for the maintenance of these engines in 2017,according to the sources.
Due to some reasons, the project was delayed. Now that the situation has improved, work on the restoration of these engines has begun in right earnest.
By August 2023, all 34 locomotives will be fully utilized in train operations, they said.
According to the sources, PR mechanical engineers and Chinese engineers work together in shifts to produce modern technology at an economical and environmentally friendly expense.
The railway engineers in the workshop are preparing cost-effective locomotive engines without exceeding the limits of resources, says General Manager Maintenance and Service Salman Sadiq Sheikh.
He mentioned that these engines were different from others because they were being prepared using up-to-date technology, which would mean that they would produce less pollution.
The future laborers at the locomotive workshop will also be skilled at maintaining these engines, which will be good for Pakistan Railways, said he.
