Pak, China to execute delayed ML-1 project

Pakistan and China on Thursday agreed to execute the multibillion dollar Mainline-1 (ML-1) project on priority basis. ML-1 is the flagship project of the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).

The much awaited mega project, which is aimed at revamping and modernizing the country’s age-old railway infrastructure, would now be executed on priority basis while addressing the technical issues linked with the project.

According to officials the agreement was reached at a virtual meeting between CPEC Authority and National Development and Reforms Commission (NDRC) of China to follow up on the decisions taken during the recent visit of the Prime Minister to China.

Special Assistant to the Prime Minister (SAPM) on CPEC affairs Khalid Mansoor and Director General NDRC co-chaired the meeting. The Ambassador of Pakistan in China also participated.

The meeting decided that Pakistan Railways would immediately contact the China National Railway Administration (NRA), to work out further details of the project.

The NDRC Director General said that the relevant Chinese institutions were already taking the necessary actions to implement the understandings reached during the visit.

He said that the Chinese side attaches the utmost importance to the ML-1 project and several internal meetings between the National Railway Administration and other relevant institutions have been held to work out the modalities and prepare for execution of the first phase of the project.

Earlier it was reported that Pakistan Railways’ multi-billion dollars ML-1 project has been delayed due to design fault and lack of capacity of consultant despite its approval from relevant authorities.

Apart from some technical issues, the Chinese side had also reportedly taken up the issue of the security element of the project which was deleted by CDWP. While rationalizing the cost of PC-I of the ML-1 project, the CDWP had deleted the cost of providing security which was at the rate of one per cent of the project cost ($79.567 million).

It may be mentioned here that PC-1 for the up-gradation of ML-1 was approved by the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) in its meeting on August 5, 2020 at a rationalized cost of $6.806 billion.

As per the document ML-1 had basically three different component including package-I of ML-I at the cost of $ 2.7 billion which include Nawabshah-Rohri section (183 Km), Multan-Lahore section (339 Km), Lahore-Lalamusa section (132 Km), Kaluwal-Pindora section (52 Km) and upgradation of Walton railway academy at Lahore.

Under Package-II, the cost of $2.67 billion was approved for up-gradation of Kiamari-Hyderabad section (182 Km) and Hyderabad-Multan section (566 Km) excluding work done on Nawabshah-Rohri section in Package-I.

While under Package-III, the ECNEC approved a cost of $1.42 billion for construction of Lalamusa-Rawalpindi section (105 Km), Rawalpindi – Peshawar section (174 Km) and establishment of a dry port near Havelian.

During the meeting on Thursday SAPM CPEC affairs stated that the Prime Minister’s meeting with the Chinese leadership had been extremely fruitful and the relevant institutions of the two countries were fully geared to take the necessary steps to translate the understandings reached at the highest level into actual actions on the ground at the earliest.