The Indian Railways has decided to increase the advance reservation period from the current 90 days to 120 days from March 10, on an experimental basis, for long-distance trains. Officials say the move will reduce the waiting list for trains and will thus help passengers plan their journeys better. They will also take the passengers’ feedback into account and made necessary changes in future.

Some passengers Governance Now spoke to were not happy with the idea. Rahul Pathak, director in a PR firm in Delhi whose family lives in Patna, said: “Only touts, tourists and LTA (leave travel allowance) travellers can plan their journey four months in advance. For a common man, it’s almost impossible.”

Ahmedabad-based lawyer VR Prasad said railway was making a mockery of the common man. “A rich person gets a Tatkal ticket easily, thanks to the touts and corrupt railway officials. It’s ironical that railway wants the common man to plan his travel four months in advance and a rich man to plan 24 hours in advance,” he said. Prasad asked, “Are they going to increase the number of coaches in order to accommodate all those who will be in waiting list? What kind of experiment is it going to be where people will be in constant fear of not being able to travel till the time of their journey?”

Akshay Khatri, an IIM Ahmedabad student, alleged that this was a ploy to generate revenue. He said railways had not increased fares for the past eight years and this had led to a financial crisis. To deal with this, they first increased the booking period from one month to two months and then to three months. And now it’s going to be four months. For four months, passengers’ money lies blocked in railways’ account and generates interest for railways. It’s inevitable that with the increased booking period, there will be higher number of cancellations. The cancellation charge for a ticket has been increased quite a few times during this period. When Lalu Prasad was the railway minister, cancellation charge was Rs 20 for an AC three-tier ticket. Now the cancellation charge is Rs 60 for the same. Assuming that 60 percent people get their tickets cancelled, the revenue generated by cancellation will be huge. Khatri said, “Railway is raising short term finance free of cost from the public.”

However, a senior railway board member who didn’t want to be named said, “We have always provided extra coach in case the waiting list increases beyond 200. In special cases like summer vacations and festive seasons, we run special trains.”

Replying to allegations that this was a ploy by railways to increase revenues, the official said, “The interest generated on the parked money, or the sum generated from cancellations will be peanuts. Our concern is how people can plan their journeys better. As simple as that”.

Speaking to Governance Now, Anil Saxena, additional director general (public relations) of Indian Railways, said the service was being introduced to understand the issues on different train routes. “If the number of waitlisted passengers increases, we will be able to identify the areas where it happens frequently and we will also be able to understand the reason behind it. Since this is being done on an experimental basis, we expect feedback from passengers and benefit from it.” Saxena said.

While the experiment goes on, Raghu Mahto, a factory worker in Gurgaon, who often has to travel to Darbhanga at short notice to attend to his ailing mother, hopes that something good would come out of it.