Recently, I needed to book my train tickets to go from Bangalore to Trivandrum, my native place, by the daily Kanyakumari Express (Island Express) of the Southern-Indian Railways. The date of travel was 22nd of December, and since I didn't want to get caught in the RAC/waitlist categories, I approached the counter as soon as the ticket issue opened for the journey - exactly 60 days earlier to my date of travel. But, to my surprise, I found that, by the time I could reach the counter (which was around 1.00 in the afternoon), all tickets was sold out and I was waitlisted at 170. I couldn't believe this, since such a thing never happened to me earlier.
When I tried to book return tickets for my wife for the 30th December, again on the opening day, I found myself in a similar situation. I couldn't help wondering how this could happen. The last time I booked tickets on this train was during the same time last year and I had no such problem, even when I booked the tickets a good 10 days after the issue opened. What could've gone wrong between the last year and this year? The answer was 'Railway Online Reservation System'. Indian railways started giving away tickets through the internet sometime during the last year. I'm not exactly sure on the timeframe, maybe this system started before that, but it became popular only during the last year or so. So, during vacation times (which are aplenty in India), all tickets get booked just minutes after the ticket issue opens. Given the technological capabilities of the current internet scenario and the related technologies like online payments and such, I knew after all this was not really impossible to happen. Just for the sake of calculations, let us say there are 1500 (22 compartments * 70 seats) tickets available for a day's journey , and even if two tickets were issued to each district (there are more 600 of them) in India, you will be left with just 300 tickets. Carrying the same argument forward, the whole thing will be shot down by 2.5 tickets per district! The biggest culprits here is however, the travel agents, who can book tickets in bulk. Unfortunately, the reservation system makes it very easy for misusing it too, because there is no restriction in the number of accounts a single individual can create. Each account allows to book a maximum of 4 tickets. Simple calculation will tell you, that for 1500 tickets to go in a flash, you just need 375 acccounts, which may belong to just a handful of people...For all you know, all these 375 accounts could even belong to just one single guy! Things are so simple with the system...to misuse it!
But, the fact that the number of people exposed to the internet or even computers in India is way too less (maybe around 5% of the total population - this is a wild guess), makes the likelihood of somebody living in such circumstances (especially the villages) reserving a ticket online, miniscule. I don't think it is really exaggerating to say that the average Indian still is left behind of the technological advances that happen around him, unable to benefit anything reasonable out of such efforts by the government. Given such a scenario, what is the average Indian supposed to do? Is he supposed to be denied a ticket on the, till recently, very accessible mode of travel for an average Indian - the Indian railways - because of a "better standard of living"?
Don't mistake me for a social worker, who works for the up-lifting of the Indian public, or even voice their concerns, but I am just one of those many people who gets irritated by the carefree and negligent attitude of the concerned authorities over such happenings. Infact, one gets more irritated (even to the extent of 'blood boiling', so to say) when you learn that the authorities themselves promote such wrong doings, in many cases. So, it is upon us to figure out a way to fight these. Let us think about the possibilities, in this particular case, to distribute the benefits of technology to the general public and avoid miscreants getting away with all the benefits...am just asking you to wait till my next post...
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