North Western State Railway

North Western State Railway
	1909 Map of the North Western State Railway
Overview
Locale	Punjab Province; Sind Province; North-West Frontier Province; Baluchistan, Karachi, British Raj
Dates of operation	1886–1947
Predecessor	Scinde, Punjab & Delhi Railway; Indus Valley State Railway; Punjab Northern State Railway; Sind–Sagar Railway; Sind–Pishin State Railway; Kandahar State Railway
Successor	Pakistan Western Railways; Eastern Punjab Railway

The North Western State Railway (NWR) was formed in January 1886 from the merger of the Scinde, Punjab & Delhi Railway, the Indus Valley State Railway, the Punjab Northern State Railway, the eastern section of the Sind–Sagar Railway and the southern section of the Sind–Pishin State Railway and the Kandahar State Railway.^[2]

History[]

Fortified North Western State Railway bridge over the Indus at Attock, 1895

The military and strategic concerns for securing the border with Afghanistan were such that, Francis Langford O'Callaghan (who was posted from the state railways as engineer-in-chief) was called upon for a number of demanding railway projects, surveys and constructions in the Northwest Frontier.^[3] What initially started off as military and strategic railway project, ended up becoming part of the North Western State Railway network upon its formation in 1886. The Bolan Pass railway was completed in 1886 and in 1887 the Khawaja Amran Railway Survey included the Khojak Tunnel and the Chaman Extension Railway.^[4] The Khojak Tunnel opened in 1891 and the railway reached Chaman near the Afghan border. By 1905, it was the longest railway under one administration and the strategic railway of the entire Northwest frontier. In 1947, much of the North Western State Railway fell in Pakistan territory domain and became part of the Pakistan Western Railways, while railways in Indian territory became incorporated into the Eastern Punjab Railway.^[5]

Mergers[]

The North Western State Railway network was formed by merging several major and minor railways together. These included:

Major railways absorbed[]

Minor railways absorbed[]

Quetta Link Railway, opened in 1887
Jammu–Sialkot Railway, opened in 1897
Kasur–Lodhran Railway, opened in 1909, dismantled in 1917 and rebuilt in 1922
Shorekot Road–Chichoki Railway, opened in 1910
Trans–Indus Railway, opened 1913
Sialkot–Narowal Railway, opened in 1915
Shahdara Bagh–Narowal Railway, opened in 1926

Construction[]

The North Western State Railway undertook a major railway expansion program, which included:

, opened in 1906 and extended to Kasur in 1910^[6]
Bahawalnagar–Fort Abbas Railway, opened in 1928 and financed by the Princely Bahawalpur State
Mari Indus Railway, opened in 1913
, under survey in 1909 but never constructed
Dandot Light Railway, opened in 1905 to serve the Khewra Salt Mine
Hyderabad–Badin Railway, opened in 1905, dismantled in 1917 and rebuilt in 1922
Jacobabad–Kashmore Railway, opened in 1911
Mari–Attock Railway, opened in 1891
Kotri–Rohri Railway, opened in 1900 following the completion of Kotri Bridge in 1899
Khanai–Hindubagh Railway, opened in 1921
Khanpur–Chachran Railway, opened in 1911 and financed by the Princely State of Bahawalpur
Khushalgarh–Kohat–Thal Railway
Khyber Pass Railway, opened in 1925 as a strategic line to Afghanistan
Larkana–Jacobabad Light Railway, opened in 1921
Mandra–Bhaun Railway, opened in 1915
Mushkaf–Bolan Railway
Nowshera–Dargai Railway, opened in 1901
, opened in 1909
, opened in 1927
Wazirabad–Multan Railway, opened in 1899
Zhob Valley Railway, opened in 1921

References[]

^ Directory of Railway Officials & Yearbook. Tothill Press. 1954. p. 114. It comprises the whole of the former North-Western system of British India except the lines in the south-eastern Punjab, now the Eastern Punjab Railway of India.
^ " Administration Report on the Railways in India – corrected up to 31st March 1918"; Superintendent of Government Printing, Calcutta; page 106; Retrieved 20 Dec 2015
^ Institution of Civil Engineers "Biographical Dictionary of Civil Engineers in Great Britain and Ireland - O'Callaghan, Francis Langford "; Retrieved on 9 Jul 2016
^ "The Imperial Gazetteer of India" v. 21, p. 14.; Retrieved on 13 Jul 2016
^ Reed, Sir Stanley (1949). The Times of India Directory and Year Book. Times of India Press. Retrieved 26 November 2016. On that day the Indian portion of tile North-Western was constituted into Eastern Punjab Railway, and the parts of the Bengal- Assam in the province of Assam were formed Into Assam Railway.
^ " Administration Report on the Railways in India – corrected up to 31st March 1918"; Superintendent of Government Printing, Calcutta; page 110; Retrieved 16 Feb 2016

External links[]

"British Library Archives and Manuscripts Catalogue" - Search; Retrieved 30 May 2016
"Grace’s Guide"; Retrieved 30 May 2016
"National Archives from the RAIL collection"; Retrieved 30 May 2016
North Western Railway Magazine - Monthly staff magazine. Some editorial content published in Urdu . No BL holdings. 2 copies (November 1942, December 1945) are held in the Berridge Papers, Cambridge South Asian Archive.
Picture of the teachers and students of St. Andrew School, Pakistan Railways (then NWR) at Lahore, set up in the late 19th century panoramio.com
Berridge, Percy Stuart Attwood. Couplings to the Khyber: the story of the North Western Railway. Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1969.
Terry Case, North Western Railway. Includes a section about Hal Waters (refer photograph album above)
"History of Northern Railway", Northern Railway.
Quetta to Lahore by Rail 1925 All Things Pakistan, now an archived website
"Breakup of the North Western Railway and the Anglo-Indian community" by Kenneth Hugh Staynor. indiaofthepast.org
Images of British Steam Locomotives used by North Western Railways Ghilzai:panoramio.com (part of this collection)
An old photograph of a Railway Inspection trolley with removable sailboard used on NWR Hyderabad-Kotri, Sindh, Pakistan. Ghilzai:panoramio.com (part of this collection)
Photograph of Troops travelling by train taken by Private J W Linley of the 2nd Battalion, The Northamptonshire Regiment compiled whilst serving in India 1923-1938. flickr.com/photos/northampton_museum
Some railway personnel in 1898. Page 179 Quarterly Civil List for the Punjab: Corrected up to 1st October 1898 Archive.org

[1] Directory of Railway Officials & Yearbook. Tothill Press. 1954. p. 114. It comprises the whole of the former North-Western system of British India except the lines in the south-eastern Punjab, now the Eastern Punjab Railway of India.

[2] " Administration Report on the Railways in India – corrected up to 31st March 1918"; Superintendent of Government Printing, Calcutta; page 106; Retrieved 20 Dec 2015

[biog-3] Institution of Civil Engineers "Biographical Dictionary of Civil Engineers in Great Britain and Ireland - O'Callaghan, Francis Langford "; Retrieved on 9 Jul 2016

[4] "The Imperial Gazetteer of India" v. 21, p. 14.; Retrieved on 13 Jul 2016

[Reed1949-5] Reed, Sir Stanley (1949). The Times of India Directory and Year Book. Times of India Press. Retrieved 26 November 2016. On that day the Indian portion of tile North-Western was constituted into Eastern Punjab Railway, and the parts of the Bengal- Assam in the province of Assam were formed Into Assam Railway.

[6] " Administration Report on the Railways in India – corrected up to 31st March 1918"; Superintendent of Government Printing, Calcutta; page 110; Retrieved 16 Feb 2016

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