Waiting listed passengers - indian rail
Guest
(Querist) 04 July 2012
This query is : Resolved
If someone books a Rail-ticket in general category through some reputed agent say Make My Trip two months in advance but get wait-listed, what could be the probability that he/she get his/her reservation confirmed four hours before the scheduled departure of that train?
My experience says probability is Zero. Why?
There are general quota, Ladies quota and Tatkal quota which can be booked online as well inline. And there is no upper caps for the great Railways and its Mini Ratna namely IRCTC. That means booking for any class namely AC I,II,3 & SL can be done even if wait-listed number is closed to infinity.In fact more the wait listed passengers merrier for the Railways and the IRCTC (For online through reputed agents say Make My Trip included).And each cancellation brings a substantial amount of money both to the IRCTC and the booking agents say Make My Trip.
There will be Tatkal supposedly 24 hours before the scheduled departure but for the convenience of the reputed Agents say Make My Trip it is restricted to 8 am to 10 am a day before the scheduled departure of the train ( now changed to 10-12 am).And there is upper cap for the TATKAL scheme to book ticket wait listed inline as well as online.
Now four hours before the scheduled departure of a train all the surrendered berths in all categories are merged into general category by the great Indian Railway booking clerks.All those discretionary quota namely Parliament House Quota, High official (Railways) quota, Foreign Tourist Quota etc etc which constitutes appx 50 % of the total seats/berths available are manually filled despite having facility of the very expensive modern computer system with our great Indian Railways.
Each day just four hours before the scheduled departures of the trains (when all the wait listed passengers to the infinity have already packed their bags and baggage and on the move to the respective railway stations)GREAT INDIAN RAILWAY TAMASHA begins and ends with catastrophic results.
Wait listed TATKAL passengers to the infinity gets the preference in allotment of seats/birth (according to the stated reply from the great intelligent customer care IRCTC executives). Therefore wait listed passengers in general quota who have already moved with their bag and baggage converge at the great Indian Railway Stations along with the wait listed Tatkal
passengers who ordinarily are blessed with the confirmed reservation though the ticket was booked wait listed inline or online just just a day before the scheduled departure of that train.
This is the trick which is being played by the great Indian Railways, the IRCTC (The great Mini Ratna)and the great Indian Railway Officials cum un official Touts who arrange booking of all Tatkal tickets blocking the server to deny ticket to Aam Admi Online and getting the tickets booked Inline employing Urchins with faked I-cards. For their convenience four berths could be booked by one urchin with one fake ID proof against four passengers.It means only one of the passengers out of the four in a ticket need to carry his/her Id card when great FRIENDLY TTEs approaches them inside the trains.It is so easy.
My question to the experts is what could be the measures taken by the well intended railway officials of the great Indian Railways to tackle this menace and what action could be taken against the Railway officials for diluting ID proof provision in favour of Crooks?
Isaac Gabriel
(Expert) 05 July 2012
Your concern is genuine.Yet we have to convince ourselves with the reply given by the railways
Railways Takes Steps to Combat Misuse of Tatkal Tickets
Posted: 03 Jul 2012 06:43 AM PDT
Railways Takes Steps to Combat Misuse of Tatkal Tickets
Muniyappa Convenes a Review Meeting of Senior Railway Officials to Further Streamline Tatkal Scheme
The Minister of State for Railways, Shri K. H. Muniyappa said that with the recent steep hike in the fares of the airlines, the demand and supply gap for Railway tickets have substantially increased which Railways is trying its best to reduce through various measures. Shri Muniyappa said this during his meeting of senior officers of Railways Board here today to review the progress of the steps taken to combat some cases of black marketing and purchase of railway tickets by touts. Member Traffic, Railway Board, Managing Director, IRCTC, Additional Member (Commercial) and other senior officers of Railway Board were present at the meeting.
Shri Muniyappa said that that the Indian Railways have been regularly monitoring the activities of the agents, touts and other individuals carrying out such activities and strict action has been initiated. The Minister said that every day on an average of around 15 lakh Railway tickets are being sold through 8838 passenger reservation ticket counters and the e-ticketing website through IRCTC, out of which the Tatkal tickets constitutes around 1.70 lakh.
Shri Muniyappa said that the Railways had introduced the Tatkal scheme to facilitate the bonafide passengers to travel by train at short notice. However, there are some reports of this facility being misused by some persons for pecuniary and personal gains, thereby defeating the very purpose of the scheme.
The Minister further said that some of the major problems being faced by the Railways are large scale sale of tickets within a short period in the counters, deployment of proxies to procure tickets at counters etc. To prevent misuse of the facility, Railways have taken steps like debarring the agents to book tickets during the first two hours, installation of CCTVs in all major booking centres to monitor the movement of touts, non issuance of duplicate in lieu of the lost Tatkal tickets and non-refund on cancellation of unused Tatkal tickets. The requirement of indicating Mobile number of the passenger in the application form is also being insisted to cross verify the genuineness of the passenger. Besides these measures, attaching the photo copy of identity proof of passenger has been made mandatory for booking of Tatkal tickets and carrying of ID card have also been made compulsory for all passengers of AC classes.
In addition, it has further been decided to change the time of booking of Tatkal tickets at the counters from existing 8.00 A.M. to 10.00 A.M. with effect from 10th July, 2012 to avoid congestion in the morning hours at counters for the normal advance booking passengers. The restriction on the agents for Tatkal tickets booking during the first two hours shall also continue. The Minister said that these steps have started yielding results.
The Minister also said that surprise inspections and preventive checks are being conducted regularly at reservation centres to contain the activities of the unauthorized agents and touts. These checks are intensified during peak/rush period and festival seasons. The department has carried out around 82,000; 61,000; and 65,000 surprise checks during 2009-10 to 2011-12, said the Minister. Against these surprise checks, around 4200 touts were apprehended and an amount of around Rs. 63,68,000/- were realized as fine and around 2000 persons were convicted. The connivance of around 170 Railway officers were also found during the above surprise checks against whom departmental actions were initiated which resulted in imposing of various penalties upon 102 officials including major penalties like removal, reversion from service etc.
The Minister said that IRCTC, a public sector undertaking of the Ministry of Railways which handles ticketing website, has also taken several steps to prevent touts and unauthorized agents from their illegal activities. Several technological innovations like increase in the bandwidth of internet, augmenting E-Ticketing software licences, technical evaluation of mobile based technology etc. are regularly being undertaken to cope up the demand and minimize the misuse of the system by unscrupulous people, added the Minister.
The Minister informed that the Ministry of Railways has also initiated steps to augment e-ticket handling capacity of its website through short term and long term measures. Due to these steps, the present capacity will increase from existing about 3.5 lakh bookings to around 5 lakh bookings per day in about four months period in the short term which will further be increased to about 8 lakh bookings per day in the long term plan. He informed that both IRCTC and CRIS are working jointly in this direction.
Shri Muniyappa said that wide publicity is being given at regular basis both through the print and electronic media appealing the general public to purchase ticket only from authorized sources so as to prevent prosecution and penalty. He appealed to the general public to co-operate with the Railways to make the system work successfully.
SAINATH DEVALLA
(Expert) 05 July 2012
Malpractices can be done in abundance in each and every department,according to their spheres.But railways have a wider scope.Though effortsw are being made to curtail corruption in sale of confirmed/rac/wt listed/tatkal tickets,the vigilance department of the railways has to be blamed for their inefficiency.
Guest
(Querist) 07 July 2012
Hon'Ble Minister has noble intention but lack wherewithal to tame the bureaucrats. Politicians barring a few Maharajas, Maharanis, Nawabs and Kababs are temporary whereas the bureaucrats are permanent.Such BRUTAL misuse of the reservation system even after very expensive computer system in place wouldn't have been possible without the direct connivance of those permanent staff i.e the bureaucrats, the reservation Superintendents and UDC/LDCs.
I have already highlighted why Tatkal without any upper cap on the booking of wait listed passengers is a direct invitation to corrupt railways staff who are in charge of the reservations ONLINE as well as Inline. As per the very senior executive of IRCTC Waitlisted Tatkal passengers are given preferences over the wait listed passengers who booked ticket well in advance Inline or ONLINE.It is this very HANKY-PANKY which encourages Railway Staff to double the role of a Tout and book the tickets Inline employing Urchins and not verifying the ID proofs of those Urchins at all. When the Rakshaka are Bhakshaks what Hon'Ble minister will do other than issuing pres statement preapred by his permanently settled Bureaucrats.If your Minister is serious let him ;-
a)Revoke Tatkal Scheme forever.
b)Ensure Tarnsparency of allotment of all discretionary quota namely Parliament House, Very Senior Railway Officer, Defence, Foreign Tourists, Lowly place Railway staff on duty , senior citizen, Ladies quota which constitute more than 50 of the total available berths in any category.
c) Ensure those reserve category berths are also booked online doubly ensuring the credentials.
d) Ensure all reserve category berths are surrendered at least 4 days from the date of scheduled departure of a train.
e) Ensure that surrendered berths are allotted automatically to the waitlisted passengers with no room for any discretionary powers to any body.
f) If revoking Tatkal QUOTA IS NOT possible then the minister to ensure that there is a cap on issue of Waitlisted tickets both Inline & Online for General as well as Ladies Quota.
g) That there is cap on booking of TATKAL wait listed passengers and no preference is given to allotment of surrendered tickets ( reserved quota) which is made effective only 4 hours from the scheduled departure of the train when almost all hopefuls with waitlisted tickets had already moved from their respective places towards the railway station giving rise chaos confusion and a killing ground for the friendly TTEs, the RPF, the Touts , The reservation Clearks etc.
IT IS NOT VERY DIFFICULT TO ELIMINATE THE touts AS THEY ARE INSIDE THE WINDOWS AND NOT OUT AS PER THE GENERAL PERCEPTIONS.
