ISLAMABAD   -   Federal Minister for Communications Ab­dul Aleem Khan on Wednesday stressed to double the revenue of National Highway Authority to make it self-sustainable and sought out a plan in this regard.

A detailed briefing was given to Abdul Al­eem Khan by the Chairman NHA Arshad Majeed Mohmand along with top tier man­agement of the road authority. 

Businessman turned politician Aleem Khan was given additional charge of the Ministry of Communications few weeks back as he is already holding the portfolio of the federal minister for privatisation in the federal cabinet.

The NHA officials informed the minister regarding all ongoing projects including their scope, mode of execution and present physical and financial progress.

Abdul Aleem Khan expressed his sat­isfaction over the pace of development work on different projects and desired to complete the projects on their given time­frame. 

He however expressed his concern re­garding decreasing revenue of the road au­thority and stressed to double the revenue by using all available resources.

He directed the concerned officials to im­mediately prepare a plan to increase the revenue of the road authority and sought a proper strategy in this regard. 

It is pertinent to mention here that ear­lier during the last government, the fed­eral minister for communications Murad Saeed had also made tall claims to increase the revenue of road authority to manifolds but couldn’t achieve the desired results throughout his stay in the ministry.

However, circles concerned believed that Abdul Aleem Khan has the capacity to in­crease the revenue of the road authority as he has vast business experience and he knows the market very well.

Meanwhile, the minister also expressed his displeasure over the enforcement of axle load management on the national road network and said imposing fines alone for overloading is meant to legitimise an ille­gality.

He said the overloaded trucks shouldn’t be allowed to enter on the motorways and they must be diverted towards local roads to avoid damages to the national road net­works.

He also desired to enhance the road con­nectivity towards north to promote tourism by expanding motorway network up to the Gilgit and Skardu. 

It was his maiden briefing regarding NHA and he remained focused on revenue gen­eration and self sustainability however peo­ple are still uncertain regarding his future in the ministry as there are the rumours of the allocation of this ministry into another individual in next reshuffle.