Title - Railways conduct drive against touts

LUCKNOW: The vigilance department of northern railway has conducted intensive drive against touts and unauthorised travel agents in the summer months. The drive has not only been conducted against touts, unauthorized travel agents but also against passengers travelling on transferred tickets purchased from unauthorized sources/agencies. Besides, joint checks have been conducted by northern railway vigilance in association with commercial department and RPF. In addition, checks have also been carried out in mass contact areas at PRS/booking centers, platforms, trains, parcel offices and catering units to detect malpractices in these areas.For the purpose of conducting surprise checks, teams of vigilance inspectors along with RPF staff have been formed and checks have been conducted at sensitive locations on the basis of source information. So far, 648 touts have been apprehended under section 143/144 of Railways Act 1989.Checks have been carried out on trains and 1,502 persons were detected travelling on tickets reserved in the name of other (fictitious) persons and an amount of Rs 9,02,941 was realized as railway dues from them. Besides, 23 unauthorized travel agents have been apprehended under section 143 of the Railway Act and prosecuted.

Intensive checks in the mass contact area have been carried out at all important locations specially PRS (Public Reservation System) center over Northern Railway. Such locations include New Delhi, IRCA Building, PRS locations at Old Delhi, Hazarat Nizammudin, Anand Vihar, Sarojni Nagar, Ghaziabad, Lajpart Nagar, Ludhianana, Jalandhar, Ambala, Banaras, Lucknow, Moradabad, Haridwar and Rohtak among others.