Caretaker minister irked by slow pace of work on Orange Line

Caretaker Minister for Transport and Mass Transit Col (retd) Dost Muhammad Chandio has expressed his serious annoyance at the slow pace of work in building the Orange Line section of Bus Rapid Transit System (BRTS) being funded and constructed by Sindh government.

Chandio visited the site of the Orange Line section on Friday, which is being built from Orangi Town as it will merge with the under-construction federal government-funded Green Line section in Nazimabad.

The caretaker minister expressed apprehension that the Orange Line section could not be completed in nearly two years time. The groundbreaking of the project was done in June, 2016.

Expressing annoyance at the delay, Chandio said that if need be he would go along with officials and engineers of the project to China, where they would be sent for technical training. “It seems that engineers and other expert officials associated with the project themselves are not abreast with updates and details of the project,” he said. “Where ever there is a hurdle, please do let us know as we will remove it to complete the project.”

Hanif Muhammad Mirchiwala, the managing director of the project, and other engineers associated with it briefed the caretaker transport minister on the progress and said they were working with the aim to complete it by September this year.

The BRTS Orange Line section, renamed Abdul Sattar Edhi Line, has an estimated cost of Rs2.3 billion and is 3.88 kilometres long with six bus stations, five of which of will be on ground, while one would be elevated. Every bus station would be about 70 metres long and the bus depot built for the project would have the capacity to park 30 buses. The line is expected to carry 50,000 passengers daily.

Polling day cleanliness

Caretaker Chief Minister Fazalur Rehman has directed the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) and other local bodies to ensure proper cleanliness and necessary facilities in the area where polling stations would be set up in the city.

Speaking to Karachi Mayor Wasim Akhtar, who called on him at the CM House on Friday, Rehman said he had already directed the local bodies to keep their areas clean and get all the roads and drainage system repaired, if required, so that voters could reach their polling stations without any problem.

He added that while most of the roads had been reconstructed, there were still some lanes and streets with potholes and overflowing gutters. “I want all these dilapidated roads and gutter systems to be fixed before the polling day,” he said. “We [caretaker set-up] want to ensure that there should be good atmosphere everywhere in the province when polling is started.”

Mayor Akhtar assured the CM that he would ensure proper maintenance of roads and drainage system and would also coordinate with other local bodies working in the city for cleanliness and repair works.

He told the CM that ahead of the anticipated monsoon season, the cleaning of storm water drains had been started and would be completed within the next few days. “This would develop positive impact on the disposal of waste water in the city,” Akhtar said.