Indian Railways ticketing rules: Emergency quota rules tightened; same-day requests barred

The Indian Railways has issued a brand new round revising its emergency quota (EQ) pointers, requiring all requests to be submitted a minimum of a day earlier than journey.The transfer, geared toward making certain well timed chart preparation and avoiding operational delays, follows latest modifications in reservation chart timings and Tatkal bookings.As per the round issued on Tuesday, “Emergency quota request for all the trains leaving between 0000 hours and 1400 hours should reach the EQ cell up to 1200 hours on the previous day of journey.” For trains scheduled between 14:01 hours and 23:59 hours, the cutoff is 4:00 pm on the previous day. Requests acquired on the identical day as departure will not be accepted.In case of Sundays or public holidays, EQ requests should be submitted on the earlier working day. “The requests for the release of accommodation in trains, for which the emergency quota is to be released on Sundays or clubbed holidays after Sundays, should be given during office hours on the previous working day,” the round said.The Railway Board’s EQ cell receives a excessive quantity of requests from VIPs, senior officers, and different departments. The ministry acknowledged this, saying, “All efforts are made to allot the quota judiciously and with common prudence.” Officers have been instructed to strictly adhere to the brand new submission timings to keep away from disruptions. “The allotments are given in time and chart preparation is not delayed, which not only results in extreme difficulties to the travelling public but can also lead to a delay in the departure of trains,” it added.The ministry additionally directed forwarding authorities to confirm the authenticity of every request and adjust to present pointers to forestall misuse.These modifications come amid broader reforms to the ticketing system. Indian Railways lately revised its chart preparation time to eight hours earlier than departure for higher passenger readability. For trains leaving earlier than 2:00 pm, reservation charts will now be finalised at 9:00 pm the earlier night.Tatkal bookings have additionally seen reforms. From July 1, solely verified customers can e-book Tatkal tickets through IRCTC. OTP-based authentication is about to be rolled out by the tip of the month. Users might want to validate their identification utilizing Aadhaar or different authorities IDs linked to DigiLocker.A brand new passenger reservation system can also be within the works and anticipated to go dwell by December 2025. As per ET, the upgraded system will be capable to course of 150,000 ticket bookings per minute, 5 occasions the present capability, and deal with 4 million enquiry requests per minute. It will characteristic a multilingual interface, permit customers to decide on seat preferences, view fare calendars, and supply devoted reserving options for Divyangjan, college students, and sufferers.Indian Railways can also be contemplating a transfer to cut back or take away “clerkage” fees deducted from refunds on cancelled or unconfirmed waitlisted tickets. Currently, passengers lose Rs 60 for reserved and Rs 30 for unreserved second-class tickets, even when cancelled on-line. If scrapped, this may supply important aid to waitlisted travellers.