Daily Times

Minister for Railways Khawaja Saad Rafique while expressing deep grief over the loss of precious six lives in a tragic railway fire incident on Thursday informed the National Assembly that possibility of sabotage could not be ruled out in the tragic incident. Replying to various supplementary questions during Question Hour and giving policy statements in the National Assembly, the minister said the factual situation would be cleared within one to two days after an inquiry into the incident. He said unfortunately, six persons including 77 years old woman, and three children have lost their lives due to breaking out of fire at AC Business passenger coach of Karachi Express. Apparently, the fire broke out due to short-circuiting, but he was not satisfied with this narrative, he added. He said an inquiry has already been ordered and the incident would be thoroughly reviewed. The minister said the railways restored its operation from its own resources without any support from the government as last year’s devastating floods caused huge losses to railways infrastructure. To a question, he said there were two types of level crossings over the PR network i.e. un-manned and manned level crossings. The unmanned level crossings were without gate leaves, he said. He said there was a total of 1,565 unmanned level crossings over the PR network. As per railway policy in vogue, the up-gradation of any unmanned or manned level crossing was the responsibility of the road-owning authority, he said.