Come Friday, the fares of India’s premium trains — Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duranto — will become costlier.
Come Friday, the fares of India’s premium trains — Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duranto — will become costlier. The hike, in the range of 10 to 50 per cent, is based on dynamic fare pricing used by most airlines. Simply put, the later you book, the more you pay.
The Railways on Wednesday announced that it is introducing “Flexi Fare System” for all the Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duranto trains from September 10 onwards. While tickets for the first 10 per cent berths of these trains will be sold at the rack rate, subsequent bookings will become costlier.
With 80 Rajdhani and Duranto trains running across the country daily, the Flexi Fare System is expected to generate an additional revenue of about Rs 250 crore for Indian Railways in a year.
Except for First Class AC and the Executive class, the Flexi Fare System applies to all other classes on these three trains. Fares for these two classes remains static.
Explaining how the new fare system will work, the Railways stated, after the first 10 per cent berths, tickets for every next 10 per cent berths will become dearer by 10 per cent each, subject to a prescribed ceiling. Tickets already sold will not attract the revised charges.
“In the case of Third AC berths in Rajdhani and Duranto trains, after the first 10 per cent of berths are sold, tickets for the next 10 per cent berths will be 10 per cent more than the basic fare. In the case of berths between 20 to 30 per cent, the fare will be 120 per cent of the basic fare. The fare will be 30 per cent costlier for berths between 30 to 40 of the total berths, while the remaining 60 per cent of the berths will be dearer by 40 per cent. All other charges will continue at the current rates,” the ministry of railways said in a press release.
Second air-conditioned tickets in Rajdhani and Duranto trains will also follow the same dynamic fare system with the difference that the last 50 per cent of the berths would be sold at a flat 50 per cent higher price than the basic fare.
Chair car tickets on Shatabdi trains too will have 10 per cent increase in the tickets sold in each 10 per cent of the slabs, while the last 50 per cent of the berths will be 50 per cent dearer.
Sleeper Class tickets in Duranto trains will also attract the pricing in a similar manner — the last 50 per cent berths would be 50 per cent costlier, while 10 per cent increase in price will come in effect for each 10 per cent slab of the berths.
First AC, whose fare is already quite high, and the Executive Class in Shatabdi trains, have been spared the increase in fare.
In the case of New Delhi-Mumbai Rajdhani, the existing basic fare for 3rd AC is Rs 1,628, which will now peak at Rs 2,279.
Similarly, the basic fare for 2nd AC class is Rs 2,369, which will become Rs 3,554 at the maximum.
The Railways had introduced dynamic fare pricing for about 35 premium trains on high-traffic routes two years ago, and this pricing formula has now been extended to Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duranto trains as well.
The Railways has also said that vacant berths in trains will be made available to passengers at the rate at which the last ticket was sold. Tickets sold under Tatkal would be 50 per cent more than the basic fare.
The Railways has also stated that the last price of the tickets in various classes would be printed in the reservation charts displayed at the stations so that the difference is recovered from those travelling without tickets.
