Image used for representation Photo Credit: The Hindu
The Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) has announced that it has discontinued its scheme to compensate passengers for delays in private trains five years ago.
The information was obtained in response to a request filed by news agency PTI under the Right to Information (RTI) Act.
The Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) was established by the Ministry of Railways with the basic objective of handling all the catering and tourism activities of the railways and currently handles ticket booking and private trains as well.
According to IRCTC, passengers were compensated Rs 2.6 lakh under this scheme from October 4, 2019 to February 16, 2024.
According to the information, only in 2023-24, passengers were compensated Rs 15.65 lakh.
“The scheme to provide compensation in case of delay or running of private trains has been discontinued with effect from February 15, 2024,” IRCTC said in its RTI reply.
The corporation refused to divulge the reason behind the move saying it was confidential. According to the RTI reply, IRCTC operates two Tejas trains – one from New Delhi to Lucknow (from October 4, 2019) and the other from Ahmedabad to Mumbai (from January 17, 2020).
The reason behind paying compensation to passengers was to attract them to these trains, which was a part of marketing activities, it said.
1.78 lakh in 2019-20, nil in 2020-21, 96,000 in 2021-22, 7.74 lakh in 2022-23 and 15.65 lakh in 2023-24 have been given to the corporation, the RTI reply said.
On the question of compensation to the passengers if the train is late, he said that if the train is delayed for 60 to 120 minutes, the passenger will be compensated Rs. minute.
According to IRCTC, passengers were given full fare refunds in case of train cancellation and food and water facilities were also provided to passengers in case of delays.
published – Dec 24, 2024 06:53 pm IST