Faced with a shortage of ticket-checkers, Indian Railways is fretting about the revenue it may be losing to ticketless travellers and unreserved passengers who sneak into reserved coaches.

As a temporary measure, the public transporter is asking its reservation staff, and those in enquiry counters to fill in as ticket-checkers.

Online bookings

It is possible because the workload at enquiry and reservation counters has come down after online ticker booking has gone up dramatically. Fewer people are queuing up at the ticket counters, as 65 per cent of reservations are done online. The share of online booking, which was started in 2005, crossed 45 per cent by 2011. Since then, it has climbed.

The Railway Board officials recently discussed the problems faced by Zonal Railways due to lack of ticket checking staff. It causes revenue leakage to the Railways and inconvenience to passengers, said a recent note of the Railways.

The note added that the Railway Board had decided that as a temporary measure, the enquiry-cum-reservation-clerk (ECRC) may be “entrusted with stationary ticket checking and stationary ticket checking staff may be entrusted with onboard checking activities. ECRC staff must be trained before being put on ticket checking duties.”

Fines collection

The fines ticket-checkers in Railways have been collecting from offenders went up last year. Between April and November 2018, ticket checking officials nabbed a staggering 1.9 crore people who were travelling without tickets or with improper tickets, and collected penalties worth ₹1,242 crore.

The figures stood at 1.68 crore defaulters and ₹1,041 crore during the corresponding period the previous year.

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