New norms permit 6 rail e-tickets in a month

In an attempt to further block touts indulging in bulk booking, Railways has now amended rules whereby only six tickets a month could be booked by one user of the online portal. The change will come in effect from February 15. Currently, 10 tickets could be booked by a user in a month. The Railways has also come out with a circular for unreserved tickets of Rs 199 and less, which would now be valid only for three hours after being issued. The change has been made with a view to stop misuse of unreserved tickets. “It has been found in our survey that 90 per cent of the users of the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism portal book six or less tickets a month. It has been only 10 per cent of the users, who we suspect to be touts, book more than 10 tickets a month. Therefore, curtailing number of tickets per user a month could allow genuine travellers to avail the facilities,” said a senior official of the Railway board.

However, the existing condition will continue wherein booking will be subject to a limit of two Tatkal tickets between 10 am-12 am period in a day and two opening advance reservation period tickets in 8 am to 10 am period in a day. The IRCTC had recently made 35 seconds’ waiting mandatory for booking of tickets on its portal.

In another decision, the Railways has restricted the validity of an unreserved ticket to just three hours from the time of being issued. “It has been seen that the ticket was being misused for travels not paid for and therefore the new measure will ensure that there is no misuse of the unreserved ticketing,” added the official.