Indian Railways booked an extra 10 per cent passengers between November 12 and 22, the period during which it allowed people to book tickets after first round of chart preparation by making cancelled seats available for booking.

“About 1.9 lakh passengers were booked between the first and second chart preparation during the ten day period. This represents a 10 per cent higher number of the total reserved tickets booked during the period,” shared a railway official.

Chart prep

Now, there are two rounds of chart preparation.

The first chart is prepared four hours before the scheduled departure, after which people are free to go online and book tickets subject to berth availability after cancellation. The second and final chart is readied 30 minutes before the actual departure.

Strict norms

This facility was introduced coinciding with the period when Railways put in a stricter ticket cancellation regime, resulting in higher cancellation charges.

Railway officials say that the easy ticket cancellation regime encouraged touts, resulting in high cancellations.

Huge cancellations

“We noticed that many of the tickets booked get cancelled at the last minute. Of the total confirmed passengers, only 81 per cent end up actually travelling. This indicates a higher level of tout activity,” said a railway source, pointing out that the airlines charge very high cancellation charges.

“Also, 25-30 per cent of ticket refund claims were fraudulent,” added the official.

Some 91 per cent of tickets were getting cancelled up to six hours before a train departure. Of the total cancellations, two-third tickets were cancelled 48 hours before the departure.

Indian Railways is yet to compile the cancellation data after the stricter rules were introduced.

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