Indian Railways Getting Tech Smart
Nivedan Prakash, Mar 13, 2007 1256 hrs IST
Train journeys may never be the same again... Thanks to the technological advancements introduced by the Indian Railways...
Train journeys may never be the same again... Thanks to the technological advancements introduced by the Indian Railways, the world's second largest rail network after Russia.
Amongst a slew of initiatives undertaken by the Indian Railways, the one that draws most attention is the issuing of tickets through the Internet. Although this service has been there for the past few years, 2007 onwards, the railways intend to expand the service reach to all parts of the country. As such, e-tickets will be issued through e-seva of state governments, post offices, petrol pumps, and ATMs.
And to make online reservation more accessible to customers, Indian Railways have tied up with Internet service provider, Sify, to enable customers book tickets online against cash payment.
A common Web site integrating more than 50 different Web sites of Indian Railways is also being developed, with built-in facilities like e-payment and e-tendering. A commercial portal will be developed in the next three years for yield management, especially to attract traffic for returning empties and filling up vacant seats.
Then there will be train enquiry call centers, which will start functioning in all four zones of the country from the second half of this year. By dialing the telephone number 139, passengers will be able to obtain information about arrival and departure of trains, seat availability, etc, at local call rates from any part of the country.
A proposal to provide hand held computer terminals to TTEs in reserved coaches is on the anvil. How it will work is that the TTEs will feed in the current vacancy position, coach wise and berth wise in the hand held terminals, which will be directly linked to passenger reservation system (PRS) to enable allotment of vacant berths to wait-listed passengers at ensuing stations.
Further, smart cards and kiosks for ticketing are also in the pipeline.
Morever, the Railways is planning on collaborating with the Russian Railways to offer state-of-the-art technologies in railway automation, safety, collision repair, and monitoring of rail network through Global Positioning System (GPS).
The latest instance of increasing use of technology in railways is the installation of LCD television screens behind seats in the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Shatabdi Express. A forward looking measure, it will offer passengers the perfect opportunity to catch up with some fun infotainment while travelling.
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How can we Top-up these cards? This is another problem. The person in the ATVM center Top-ups just for 2 hrs a day, and that too in office timing. For my smart card, I am not able to Top-up for the past onw week. It would be better if we can Top-up online.
Cheenu | Chennai | 14/08/08 12:49 PM | Report abuse Reply
yes number 1 i say. then indian rail also will be world famous in india.
dipali | Deli | 10/06/08 07:49 PM | Report abuse Reply
Lallu is not lallu, he made a big change and uplifted the IR
Vinit | Surat | 14/03/07 10:35 PM | Report abuse Reply
If all this implemented, Indian railways will be the number one ....!
vak | hosur | 14/03/07 09:11 AM | Report abuse Reply
i hope it all works
Faiyaz | Mumbai | 14/03/07 08:48 AM | Report abuse Reply
Every thing is okay other than tie up with SIFY..
Anonymous | A | 13/03/07 11:35 PM | Report abuse Reply
All the above are okay. But toilets in the trains/stations continue to stink unbearably. Commen man will be grateful to Laluji, if this rectified.
rajan | bangalore | 13/03/07 05:54 PM | Report abuse Reply
I think the "common men" should take half the blame. Not being able to use toilets properly is a crime and should be punishable under law. Sometimes when I look at the (mostly rubbish) "drawings" I doubt whether that "natural activity" is seriously related to creativity..!!
Chandra | Chennai | 13/03/07 06:07 PM | Report abuse
The Indian Railway servers are worst if the traffic is more and their site design is poor to the core. Let us hope that all these changes in the years to come and get modernised
Raghavan | Chennai | 13/03/07 03:42 PM | Report abuse Reply
The move to book tickets easily on internet in welcome and has already proven to be a major time , effort saver. However, lately with the trend catching up the servers are finding it difficult to handle the traffic and frequently hang up wihch is fruastrating. I am sure railways will tackle the problem holisticaly.
maran | coimbatore | 13/03/07 01:58 PM | Report abuse Reply