Cost: The government of Punjab is spending Rs162
billion for the transportation of 250,000 residents
of Lahore. Question: How much is Rs162 billion?
Answer: Rs162 billion for 250,000 passengers amounts
to Rs650,000 per passenger. For the record, Mehran
VX sells for Rs630,000 and, in effect, the
government of Punjab could have bought a Mehran VX
for each and every passenger.
Question: How much is Rs162 billion? Answer:
Punjab’s population stands at 101 million and
the government of Punjab spends a total of Rs59
billion on education and Rs54 billion on health
services. Every resident of Punjab will now be
taking on an additional Chinese debt of Rs1,600.
For the record, the government of Punjab spends
Rs600 on a per capita basis on education and
Rs500 on a per capita basis on health.
Question: How much is
Rs162 billion? Every three out of four residents
of Punjab do not have access to clean drinking
water. Amazingly, Budget 2015-16 allocated a
mere Rs12 billion for the water supply of 101
million residents of Punjab.
Question: How about
the Orange Line’s financial viability? Answer:
The estimated breakeven is Rs175 per ticket. At
Rs20 a ticket, the Orange Line will lose Rs40
million a day or Rs14 billion a year (operation
and maintenance is estimated at around Rs4
billion a year).
Question: What about
the debt payment to the Chinese? Answer: The
debt payment of interest and principal is
estimated at around Rs30 million a day or Rs10
billion a year (assuming that the Chinese loan
is concessional in nature).
Question: How much is
Rs162 billion? Answer: On a per kilometre basis
it converts to Rs6 billion a kilometre – the
most expensive of its kind on the face of the
planet (the cost of the Lahore Metro Bus was Rs1
billion a kilometre).
Question: How much is
Rs162 billion? Answer: The Shaukat Khanum
Memorial Cancer Hospital and Research Centre –
comprising outpatient clinics, chemotherapy
facility and an inpatient unit – is going to
cost Rs4 billion. With Rs162 billion, the
government of Punjab could have built 41 such
hospitals (Punjab has 36 districts).
For the record, 47
percent of school-age children in Punjab are
out-of-school. According to The Citizens
Foundation, the cost of building a primary
school is Rs17 million. With Rs162 billion, the
government of Punjab can build 10,000 good
quality primary schools; nearly 300 new schools
in each and every one of Punjab’s 36 districts.
For the record, there
are 2.9 million school-age children in Punjab
who are out-of-school. According to The Citizens
Foundation, the yearly cost of educating a child
is Rs15,000. The yearly cost of educating all of
the 2.9 million will be Rs44 billion.
Someone intelligent
once said, “Things which matter most must never
be at the mercy of things which matter least.”
The writer is a
columnist based in Islamabad.
Email: farrukh15@hotmail.com
Twitter: @saleemfarrukh