The Ministry of Railways has decided to prepare reservation charts of confirmed berths or seats eight hours before the scheduled departure of trains instead of the present four hours to facilitate passenger convenience.
Railway Board proposed the changes last week and Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has directed their implementation “in a phased manner so that there is no disruption”. The board will come up with the rollout plan soon.
“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 ministry said the current practice of preparing reservation charts four hours before train departure creates uncertainty in the minds of passengers. The new timeline will greatly help them with waitlisted tickets. They will get the first update on waitlist status well in advance.
In another passenger-friendly move, the railways announced complete revamp of passenger reservation system (PRS) by Dec. The new PRS will allow over 1.5 lakh ticket bookings per minute, around five times more than the current capacity of 32,000 tickets per minute.
The ministry said the new PRS also has a multilingual and user-friendly booking and enquiry interface.
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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.
“Indian Railways will allow only authenticated users to book Tatkal tickets on the IRCTC website and its mobile app beginning 1st July, 2025,” the ministry said.
