LAHORE: Punjab’s Provincial Development Working Party approved three development schemes worth Rs63.05 billion on Monday, with the Rawalpindi Ring Road taking more than four-fifths of the total.
The ninth meeting of the current fiscal year, chaired by Planning and Development Board Chairman Dr Naeem Rauf, cleared Rs51.326 billion for the ring road’s R3 section from Banth to Thalian, Rs3.724 billion for dualisation of the Muzaffargarh Road from Jauharabad to Chowk Girote in Khushab, and Rs8 billion for a revised version of the chief minister’s Plant for Pakistan tree drive.
The ring road approval raises questions the P&D statement does not answer. The 38.3-km road runs from Banth to Thalian, and the Rawalpindi commissioner said last month it was 99 per cent complete, with its estimated cost having risen to Rs53.5 billion. The project had by then missed its sixth completion deadline.
The statement did not say whether Monday’s figure is a revised estimate for the existing project, additional work, or a fresh section, nor what had changed since the earlier approval. It also did not explain the revision to the Plant for Pakistan scheme.
The working party also approved position papers, mostly for creating posts and in three cases for buying vehicles, for eight initiatives. They include fish hatcheries for pangasius and other high-value species, the Chief Minister’s Youth Engagement Programme, a Safe City project for the Kacha riverine area, an AI hub at PIFTAC, the Punjab Legal Aid and Assistance Portal, an AI-based carbon management platform to track industrial emissions, a programme to green industries in Faisalabad, Lahore, Multan and Sialkot, and a sustainability research initiative called SPARK.
The Kacha belt along the Indus in southern Punjab has long sheltered armed gangs, and extending Safe City camera coverage there would bring the area closer to the surveillance network operating in the province’s cities.
P&D Secretary Rafaqat Ali, Chief Economist Dr Farrukh Naveed and board members attended the meeting.
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