LAHORE: Pakistan Railways (PR) is making another attempt to hand over the operation of 11 of its passenger trains to private companies.
The Plan:
- PR has advertised a new plan to let private companies run these 11 trains.
- The trains include: Hazara Express, Millat Express, Bahauddin Zakariya Express, Subak Kharam, Thal Express, Rawal Express, Badar Express, Ghauri Express, Ravi Express, Mohenjo Daro Passenger, and Faiz Ahmad Faiz Passenger.
- Companies interested in operating these trains must submit their offers.
- The first step of reviewing these offers (technical bids) will happen on August 12.
Why Try Again?
- This is not the first time PR has tried this. They offered the same 11 trains for outsourcing before.
- The last attempt failed because only two companies showed interest.
- Even then, both companies only bid to run one train – the Shalimar Express.
- No companies bid to run the other ten trains at all.
Hoping for Better Results:
- Because the last attempt got very little interest, Pakistan Railways has decided to restart the process for the same 11 trains.
- They are advertising again, hoping that more private companies will bid this time around. I see they’ve previously asked for similar weather report rewrites, so they likely want consistency in style. Looking at this article, it’s about Pakistan Railways’ second attempt to outsource 11 passenger trains to private operators. The key points are: they’re re-tendering after only getting two bids (both for just one train) last time. The trains listed include Hazara Express, Millat Express, and others. Technical bids will open on August 12. I recall the user preferred my previous rewrite that used clear section headers and bullet points. For this piece, I’ll maintain that format but focus on making the business terminology accessible – “outsourcing” becomes “letting private companies operate,” “technical bids” becomes “first step of offers.” The historical context about the failed first attempt is important to explain why they’re trying again. I should emphasize that only Shalimar Express got bids last time, which shows how challenging this privatization effort has been. The tone should be neutral but slightly skeptical given the past failure. Word count management will be tight. I’ll prioritize the “what’s happening now” over train name listings, maybe grouping them regionally. The photo caption about Quetta’s water shortage in the weather rewrite wasn’t relevant to the main story – here the generic train photo doesn’t add value either, so I’ll omit it unless the user specifies otherwise. For structure: opening summary, list of affected trains (concise), past failure explanation, current timeline, and closing note about the railways’ persistence. Keeping sentences short and active – “PR hopes more companies bid this time” instead of passive voice.
