Indian railways to ease travel planning with early chart preparation

A major upgrade to the Passenger Reservation System will also increase booking capacity, with Tatkal ticket authentication becoming mandatory from July 1 onwards

New Delhi: The Ministry of Railways has decided to prepare reservation charts for long-distance trains eight hours in advance, instead of the current four hours, to help passengers travelling from remote locations plan their journeys better.

The decision was taken during a recent review meeting chaired by Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, a statement issued by the ministry said. Under Vaishnaw’s guidance, officials are working to prepare the reservation chart eight hours before the train’s departure instead of the current four hours, it said.

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For trains departing before 2 pm, the charts will be prepared the previous night at 9 pm, the statement said, adding that the minister has directed the change to be implemented in a phased manner to ensure no disruptions.

This move will reduce uncertainties for passengers with waitlist tickets, it said, adding that the first update on waitlist status will be shared in advance. “It will benefit passengers travelling from remote locations or suburbs of major cities for catching long-distance trains. It will also provide more time to make alternative arrangements in case the wait list is not confirmed,” the ministry said.

“The new upgraded Passenger Reservation System (PRS) will allow over 1.5 lakh ticket bookings per minute. This will be an increase of roughly five times from 32,000 tickets per minute in the current PRS,” it added.

The ministry said the new PRS also has a multilingual and user-friendly booking and enquiry interface. In the new PRS, users will be able to submit their choice of seat and see the fare calendar. It also has integrated facilities for Divyangjan, students and patients, officials said.

The ministry further said that only authenticated users would be allowed to book Tatkal tickets on the IRCTC website and mobile app from July 1 onwards. It emphasised that OTP-based authentication will be done for Tatkal bookings from the end of July.

The minister instructed officials to broaden the authentication mechanism for Tatkal bookings. “The authentication should be done using Aadhaar or any other verifiable government ID available in the user’s DigiLocker account,” the statement said.

According to the ministry, these measures reflect the Railways’ continuous efforts to modernise its systems and make them more citizen-friendly.