Pakistan Railways and Cybernet, the nation’s leading fibre broadband operator, have signed an agreement to deploy a state-of-the-art fibre optic network along the ML-1 railway line, stretching from Karachi to Peshawar. This partnership marks a significant leap in Pakistan’s digital infrastructure, positioning the country to meet future connectivity demands and drive economic progress.

Pakistan Railways’ extensive 7,000-kilometre network provides an ideal corridor to build high-capacity digital highways. Through this collaboration, Cybernet will enhance its intercity capacities, enabling faster, low latency broadband access in cities, while expanding fibre access to remote and underserved areas. The network will also be used to carry internet transit traffic from terrestrial networks in Central Asia to submarine cable networks in the Arabian Sea — positioning Pakistan as a strategic internet hub for the region.

Aamir Ali Baloch, chief executive officer of Pakistan Railways, remarked, “By aligning with Cybernet, we are reinforcing our commitment to contributing to the nation’s infrastructure development beyond transportation. This agreement marks a significant milestone in our efforts to diversify our role and impact for national development.”

Danish A Lakhani, chief executive officer of Cybernet, said, “We are deeply grateful to the Pakistan Railways team, the Ministry of IT and Telecom and our partner One Network for enabling us to get one step closer to achieving our collective vision. With two independent long-haul routes along the railways and the motorways, we will be building with our partners the most resilient and scalable national fibre backbone. Such a reliable, high-capacity, long-haul network is necessary to catalyse digitisation, innovation and productivity in the country and lead to economic and social uplift especially in areas underserved by ultrafast broadband.”

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