Sindh govt inaugurates province's first-ever electric bus

• Sindh Transport Minister Awais Qadir Shah inaugurates the first-ever electric bus in Karachi.
• Says the provincial government has planned to increase the number of buses each month and a tender for 250 buses will be issued soon.
• 100 new buses will be introduced in Karachi in the near future, the minister says.
• Says since 2017, the amount of work the govt should have done to develop the transport sector in the province was insufficient.

KARACHI: Sindh Minister for Transport Awais Qadir Shah on Tuesday inaugurated the first-ever electric bus in Karachi.

According to the minister, the bus will be fully electrically powered and will draw electricity from the power grid and store it in a battery. 

"The provincial government has planned to increase the number of buses each month," the minister said, adding that since 2017, the amount of work the government should have done to develop the transport sector in the province was insufficient. 

"The Sindh government will soon issue tenders for 250 new buses," Awais Qadir Shah announced. Meanwhile, he said that 100 buses will be introduced in Karachi in the near future.

In terms of fares, the minister said that passengers will have to pay Rs4 per kilometre to travel in electric buses.

He added that at the beginning, the electric bus will operate on the route connecting Tower to Sohrab Goth.

Federal govt appreciates Sindh's initiative

Taking to Twitter, Federal Minister for Science and Technology Fawad Chaudhry congratulated the Sindh government and wrote that the move to add an electric bus to Karachi Commuters System is a "remarkable step."

"The Ministry of Science & Technology is fully behind Sindh govt in this futuristic approach. Hope Punjab and KP [will] also take [the] same route ASAP," Chaudhry wrote.