ISLAMABAD - Minister for Railways Haji Ghulam Ahmad Bilour Monday informed the Lower House of the Parliament that he has been demanding for 400 locomotives for railways since long and non-provision of engines is the major reason behind the loss that Pakistan Railways has to suffer from every year.
He told the house that Railways was under debt of Rs 58.6 billion and its total loss was recorded Rs 34 billion as on January 2013. Bilour said that no new locomotives had been injected in railways since 2008 that was the main reason behind its loss and disturbing operations time to time.
While replying to a question, Bilour got emotional and said that he was ready to be dragged on the roads with cord in his neck if railways suffer from loss after locomotives are provided to it.
To another question about Marriage Train that was started in the time of Pervez Musharaf, Bilour said that train was not operational now. He also said that members should not ask him or hold responsible for the crimes of Pervez Musharaf.
Bilour confessed to the house that in March 2008, there were 406 operational engines and presently only 180 locomotives were in a condition to use. But he said that financial constraints were major reason behind all this.
Minister of State for Commerce while answering to a question informed the National Assembly that there were still 49 pharma items in negative list of trade with India.  Different percentage of custom duty was imposed on these 49 negative items if imported from India.
He said that the list of negative items mostly consisted of finished products. These finished products had been added in the list to protect the local manufacturer. Other than these items the rest of medicines and raw material were importable from India, he said.
To different questions of parliamentarians that why the government was not allowing injections import on cheaper price from India and what were the reasons behind non-manufacturing of such needed medicine in the country, he did not provided any satisfactory answer and said that the list is still under consideration and when it will be finalised the remaining items would be importable.
While answering to another question, he said that Pakistan imported goods from India during 2011-12 a worth of Rs 1.5 billion whereas it exported goods only worth of Rs 338.517 million.
 He claimed that numerous steps were taken to increase Pakistan’s export to India and the country would see the results during 2012-13.