Reviving rail routes January 31, 2021 It emerged at a meeting of the Senate Functional Committee on Problems of Less Developed Areas when a panel member told officials of the Pakistan Railways that during the British era there was a profitable railway line in Balochistan but now it had been dismantled. Possibly, he was talking about the Zhob-Quetta route, which was closed down in 1991 because of ‘consistent losses’. The panel asked the railway officials to restore the Quetta-Zahedan route at the earliest as it would facilitate pilgrims. Replying to a question about the delay in restoring the Harnai-Sibi route, the officials informed that so far of the 140-km-long railway line, restoration work on only 50kms had been completed and work on the rest 91kms had been stalled due to the law and order situation. The committee emphasised that recruitment of locals in the railway police would solve this problem. This is a sensible suggestion. It instructed the Railway Ministry to complete the Harnai-Sibi railway line in four months and submit a report to it.