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  Indian Railways News  / The Hindu : Cities / Delhi : ‘Immediate’ relief for tatkal reservation seekers

The changes in the reservation scheme, implemented from this past Tuesday, have led to improvements in the performance of the Indian Railway Catering & Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) website and in the number of bookings.

Basheer Ahmad, who got a tatkal ticket after standing in queue for around an hour or so at Nizamuddin railway station on Wednesday morning, did not have happy memories about getting tatkal tickets either from the railway reservation counter or though the IRCTC website. There were occasions when he spent the night outside the railway station just to be the first in queue, which got moving at 8 a.m.

“I came here at 9 a.m. today because I wanted to see if the new timing had made any changes in the way a common man like me gets reservation done. To my surprise, I got the reservation!” said Ahmad, a resident of Bihar.

Delhi University student Asutosh Kumar has access to Internet at home but preferred coming to the reservation counter because it is “almost impossible” to get a tatkal reservation online.

Talking about the “horrible” experience with the IRCTC website, Kumar said: “As per my experience, there is no point in trying to get a reservation through the IRCTC website. I have not yet tried booking tickets online after the changes made by IRCTC. I just hope it works because then I will not need to come to the reservation counter.”

Since Tuesday, no authorised agents, including agents of the IRCTC and others, were allowed to book tatkal tickets from 10 a.m. to 12 noon from the counters as well as the Internet.

IRCTC Joint General Manager (Public Relations) Pradip Kundu said IRCTC has been getting good feedback. The number of hits on the website site at 10 a.m., the time the tatkal tickets are open for reservation, have decreased almost by half, leading to smooth functioning of the website.

“Previously there used to be more than eight lakh hits when the counters opened for general and tatkal tickets. Since Tuesday, there have been around 4.5 lakh hits on the IRCTC site at 10 a.m. With a fixed number of berths available under the scheme, the extremely high number of hits used to play spoilsport for the common man. Since the last few days, IRCTC has been able to increase the number of reservation thanks to the series of measures it took to dilute the monopoly of touts and agents over reservation,” said Mr. Kundu.

“The changes brought about by IRCTC include increasing the bandwidth of the website from 344 mbps to 450 mbps, besides limiting reservation to two tickets per IP address. We have deleted around 44,000 multiple user IDs — a trick adopted by reservation agents and touts,” he added.

  Indian Railways News  / रेल जीएम ने काउंटर बढ़ाने का दिया निर्देश

पूर्व मध्य रेलवे के महाप्रबंधक वरुण भरथुआर ने गुरुवार की संध्या समस्तीपुर स्टेशन पहुंच कर गहन निरीक्षण किया. निरीक्षण के दौरान उन्होंने स्टेशन के सर्वागीण विकास एवं सुदृढ़ीकरण को लेकर डीआरएम को आवश्यक निर्देश दिया.दूसरी ओर उन्होंने डीजल लॉबी, यूटीएस काउंटर, पूछताछ काउंटर समेत अन्य का भी जायजा लिया. डीजल लॉबी में पहुंच कर क्रू से संबंधित समस्याएं समेत अन्य चीजों की जानकारी भी ली. इससे पूर्व हाजीपुर से समस्तीपुर तक विंडो ट्रेलिंग के माध्यम से सोनपुर मंडल के रेलखंडों, स्टेशनों, समपार फाटकों, कर्मचारियों की सतर्कता, सिग्नलिंग एवं संरक्षा से संबंधित पहलुओं की भी जांच की.समस्तीपुर स्टेशन पर पहुंचते ही मंडल रेल प्रबंधक सत्य प्रकाश त्रिवेदी ने अपने सारे वरीय अधिकारियों के साथ जीएम श्री भरथुआर का स्वागत किया. जीएम सीधे प्लेटफार्म संख्या-5 का निरीक्षण करते हुए प्लेटफार्म संख्या-1 पर पहुंचे. वहां पर उन्होंने सबसे पहले इंक्वायरी का जायजा लिया. इंक्वायरी को हाइटेक बनाने का निर्देश डीआरएम को दिया. उसके बाद वे स्टेशन के बाहर दीवार पर लगे मधुबनी पेंटिंग, डिवीजन मैप आदि को देख. इस दौरान उन्होंने इसे और बेहतर तरीके से लगाने को कहा.एफओबी के प्रवेश स्थल की उंचाई काफी कम रहने पर उन्होंने संबंधित इंजीनियर को तलब किया. उसे इसे तोड़कर उंचा करने को कहा. इसके बाद वे सीधे यूटीएस काउंटर का जायजा लेने के लिए पहुंच गये.सीनियर डीसीएम एम.एम.आइ. हुमायूं ने बताया कि पांच काउंटर संचालित होते हैं.जीएम ने कहा कि यात्रियों को कितनी देर तक टिकट लेने के लिए प्रतीक्षा करनी पड़ती है.काउंटर से पूछ कर सीनियर डीसीएम ने बताया कि करीब दस मिनट.
इस पर असहमति जताते हुए जीएम ने कहा कि भीड़ के दौरान यात्रियों को दिक्कतें होती होगी, इसलिए एक काउंटर बढ़ायें. इसके बाद वे सीधे डीजल लॉबी पहुंच गये. चालक एवं उपचालकों के ड्यूटी एवं आराम के बारें में जानकारी ली. इसके बाद उन्होंने चालकों के विश्रम आदि की व्यवस्था के बारे में पूछा.पावर फेल्योर आदि के बारे में भी उन्होंने जानकारी ली. मौके पर एडीआरएम एन.एस. पटियाल, सीनियर डीओएम, सीनियर डीएफएम समेत सभी वरीय अधिकारी मौजूद थे. स्टेशन अधीक्षक सतीशचंद्र श्रीवास्तव ने लोगों का स्वागत किया.

  Indian Railways News  / Science Express draws 80,000 students

RANCHI: Science Express at Ranchi railway station has witnessed around 80,000 footfalls in the past four days. A large number of students thronged the 16-coach facility on Friday, the last day of the train in the state capital.Of the 225 halts that the train has passed through in its past five-year journey, its stay in Ranchi has surprised all the executives. "I have not seen such a huge crowd at any place in the country," said Dilip V Surkar, the executive director of the Science Express.All the platforms, especially platform Nos 1, 4 and 5, swarmed with students on Friday. It prompted the administration to deploy police to manage the crowd. The train left for Rourkela on Friday evening where it will stay till July 17. Around 3,000 students had visited the train on Tuesday when the exhibition had begun. Wednesday witnessed 20,000-odd visitors and Thursday had 28,000 footfalls. The total number of visitors on Friday was 30,000.Science communicator Ebin Abraham said Ranchi students had similar curiosity like their counterparts in metro cities. "The children here are paying attention to minute details and are asking specific questions," Abraham said. A science communicator works as a coach to the visitors. Surbhi Anand, a student of Class VII from Sacred Heart Girls School, asked Abraham how she could save the environment.A joint initiative of the Union environment and forests ministry and the department of science and technology, the train aims to create awareness on biodiversity of India, climate change and similar issues among various audiences specially students. The exhibition has topics climate change, trans-Himalaya and the Himalaya, The Gangetic plain, Northeast India, the desert and semi-arid zones, the Western Ghats, The Deccan Peninsula, the coasts and islands as its exhibits.

The initiative is a part of the celebration of 2011 to 2020 as "United Nations Biodiversity Decade" by the UN. The same period is also being celebrated as UN Decade for Deserts and the Fight against Desertification.

Surkar said, "The huge footfall showcases nothing but inquisitiveness about environment in students and the public at large. The crowd has come without us doing any publicity."

"The entire train, especially the eight bogies, was always full of students," said Chitra Upadhayay, a science communicator. Over 50% of the visitors have been given certificates for conducting experiments.

  Indian Railways News  / Railways: a hopeless case | The Nation

One is at a loss for words to denounce the government’s insincerity to the people since it is even unable to run the Railways, which was the general public’s only source of cheap and safe source of countrywide travel. During these past four years, the department has literally gone to the dogs; there is generally shortage of diesel and locomotives and widespread prevalence of corruption and unbearably long delays in trains’ departure.

  Indian Railways News  / New Train from Karimnagar to Tirupati

Train No 12761 for Karimnagar to tirupati via karimnagar ,peddapalli, warangal,Mahabubabad,Khammam,VIjayawada,Gudur,Renigunta