No Reservation Charts In Trains From March 1; Railways Pilot Project To Last 6 Months

Indian Railways, which has the largest network in the world, plans to save money by doing away with reservation charts on all trains.

The Green initiative has already been implemented it in reserved coaches at New Delhi’s Hazrat Nizamuddin, Mumbai Central, Chennai Central, Howrah, and Sealdah stations, but now the Ministry of Railways has decided to discontinue this service on all trains for six months.

The Ministry of Railway has directed its zones to discontinue pasting reservation charts on reserved coaches of all trains at A1, A and B category stations as a pilot project for six months from March 1, an official statement said on Friday. However, physical and digital display of charts will continue at the platforms, the ministry statement said.

Based on the income from passengers, the railways classifies its stations into seven categories A1, A, B, C, D, E and F. It has 17 zones. “At those stations where electronic charts display plasma has been installed and the same is functioning properly, physical reservation charts at such platforms can be stopped,” it added.

The aim behind the move to go paperless is the green initiative by South Western Railways Bengaluru Division (SBC), which discontinued pasting charts on reserved coaches of all trains from Bengaluru City and Yeshwantpur stations from November 2016. The move helped save over Rs 60 lakh spent on paper by the division.

The Southern Railways, as part of Green Initiative, will also discontinue the practise of pasting of reservation charts on train coaches on a trial basis for six months from March 1. However, the respective coach and berth number information would still be available at centralised locations in all the railway stations and also with the travelling ticket examiners, an official release said. By moving towards paperless initiative, the southern railway would be able to save 28 tonne of charting paper and Rs 1.70 lakh every year, the release said. Other efforts include encouraging e-ticketing for both reserved and unreserved tickets, it said.

Meanwhile, Railways has initiated a massive recruitment drive to hire 89,000 employees in levels C and D. This recruitment drive has been started to hire for the posts of assistant loco pilots, technicians, switchmen, trackmen, helpers, porters and many other openings. Railway minister Piyush Goyal tweeted February 14 that they have started the recruitment process for group D for 62,907 posts. Candidates that are high school pass or have an ITI or industrial training institute degree are eligible to apply for it, last date being March 12.

(With inputs from PTI)