Before the Bullet Train

Asem Mustafa Awan

Islamabad: For decades, Pakistan’s railway system has carried millions of people across cities, towns and remote communities. But behind every departing train and changing signal is a workforce whose labour often remains invisible.

One elderly railway worker captured in this photograph represents that forgotten side of the country’s rail network. Standing beside the tracks, he is manually operating a railway switch,  a simple-looking task that can determine the path of an approaching train.

His work may appear routine, but it carries enormous responsibility.

For generations, railway employees performed such duties without the assistance of sophisticated digital control systems, automated signalling or computerised points. They relied on experience, concentration and an intimate understanding of the tracks around them.

Pakistan Railways was once a symbol of connectivity and modernisation. Its extensive network linked major cities with smaller towns, transported agricultural and industrial goods and helped drive economic activity. Railway stations became important social and commercial hubs, while trains offered one of the country’s most accessible forms of long-distance transport.

But the system has struggled to keep pace with technological change.

Ageing infrastructure, delayed maintenance, financial pressures and years of underinvestment have left parts of the railway network dependent on practices that belong to an earlier era. As technology transforms railway systems around the world, some critical operations in Pakistan continue to depend heavily on manual labour.

That makes the man in the photograph more than a railway employee. He is a reminder of the human infrastructure behind the physical infrastructure.

Every movement of the switch requires attention. Every decision carries consequences. And every shift spent beside the tracks represents another day in a job where experience can be as important as machinery.

His presence also raises a broader question about modernisation in Pakistan.

What does progress mean when the tracks may still depend on workers using methods that have changed little over generations?

Modernising a railway is not simply about buying faster trains or announcing new projects. It involves upgrading signalling systems, repairing tracks, improving safety standards, investing in technology and ensuring that the workers operating the network are properly equipped.

The photograph therefore captures two different eras at once.

The railway tracks point towards the future, towards movement, connectivity and possibility. The elderly worker points towards the past, carrying decades of knowledge that helped keep those same tracks functioning.

There is something deeply symbolic about that contrast.

A country cannot fully modernise by simply replacing old equipment with new machines. It must also recognise the people who have kept its public infrastructure alive through years of neglect and limited resources.

The man may eventually leave the railway, but the question his photograph raises will remain: how long can a system built for the future continue to rely on the hands of the past?

Perhaps true railway modernisation begins not only with faster trains, but with safer systems, better technology and greater dignity for the people who keep the trains moving.

Photo Credit: APP