Reduction in booking to 60 days: Rail users hail move, want more services, reserved tickets

CHENNAI: On Thursday, the Indian Railways announced a reduction in the time limit for reservations for trains 60 days from 120 days. It was a mixed bag of opinions from passengers in Chennai about the changes.

“When it was 120 days, it was difficult to confirm these many days ahead, especially when you book as a family, as working people may not get leave,” stated P Viswanathan, a resident of Chitlapakkam.

In such cases, even booked tickets would be cancelled. “Now, with just 60 days to book in advance, it would help to finalise the date and time of journey,” he added. “The number of Tatkal tickets should be reduced and the number of reserved tickets should be increased. The fare for Tatkal tickets is unaffordable for low-income families.”

Many rail users, including V Santhanam, president of Chromepet Rail Users Forum, concurred with him, and added: “The Railways should consider operating more services to cater the demand of the passengers.”

But K Baskar, secretary of Tiruvallur Railway Passengers Association, pointed out that the reduction in days for advance booking would “lead to a rush of passengers to book tickets”.

The railways informed through a press release that the reduction would help in reducing the cancellations which was at 21%, and no-show passengers, which was 4-5%. This would enable genuine passengers to book tickets, and also the railways to plan the extra services of special trains.

This initiative could also reduce fraudulent activities like impersonation and railway staff fleecing passengers to fill empty seats, the press release added.