Cost of PIA shifting.

THE news that PIA is shifting its head offices to Islamabad with all its paraphernalia is a shock for the people of Karachi. The airline has well-established infrastructure and facilities in the city built over the last six decades at an enormous cost that will become redundant if the airline's head offices are moved to the capital.

To establish new infrastructure in Islamabad from scratch, such as hangars and overhaul shops, flight operations, technical ground support, flight kitchen, simulator, full-fledged training centre, IT centre, etc., the government will need an enormous amount of money.

The airline has been suffering massive losses and is saddled with liabilities of hundreds of billions of rupees. It is already on life support from the government which is doling out billions of rupees out of taxpayers' money to keep national carrier afloat.

Under the circumstances, the decision to shift the head offices to Islamabad appears skewed, if not crazy...