Indian Railway Guide

Indiamike Guide to Indian Railways
The IndiaMike, The India Tree Members

Version: 1.01
March 20, 2006
When all else fails, read the instructions --/usr/bin/fortune
http://www.indiamike.com
Last Upd:May 6, 2006 1
License
Copyright 2006
c Indiamike Forum Members, The India Tree Members.
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under
the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2 or any later
version published by the Free Software Foundation; with no Invariant Sec-
tions, no Front-Cover Texts, and no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license
is included in the section entitled GNU Free Documentation License.
Status:Draft 1 Ver: 1.01

Contents
1. Introduction 7
1.1. How To use this Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2. Reservations 8
2.1. The Railway Reservation Form Explained . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
2.2. Tips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
2.3. Train Fares . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.3.1. Break of Journey Rules (B.O.J.) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
2.3.2. Circular Journey Tickets (CJT) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
2.3.3. Additional Charges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
2.3.4. The ’Value for Money’ Class . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
2.3.5. Is an Indrail pass worth the money? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
3. Cancellations 32
3.1. I-Ticket Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
3.1.1. Cancellation of tickets before departure of trains . . . . . . . . . . 33
3.1.2. Cancellation of tickets after departure of trains . . . . . . . . . . . 34
3.1.3. To cancel tickets after the above period . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
3.1.4. Cancellation of I-Tickets in case of trains cancelled . . . . . . . . . 34
3.2. e-Ticket Rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
4. Knowing the Indian Train 35

4.1. The engine(!) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
4.2. Second Class (General Compartment) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
4.3. Sleeper Class (SL) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
4.4. AC 3-Tier Sleeper (3A) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
4.5. AC 2-Tier sleeper (2A) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
4.6. First Class AC (1A) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
4.7. AC Chair car (CC) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
4.8. First Class (FC) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
4.9. Brake Van . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
4.10.Pantry Car . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
4.11.TTE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
4.12.Vendors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
4.13.Reservations over Internet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
4.14.Cancellations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
4.15.Tatkal Scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

5. Booking Indian Rail tickets from abroad 47

5.1. Registration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
5.2. Plan the Travel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
5.3. Website Connection Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
6. Miscellaneous Info 52
6.1. Luggage Allowances . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52
6.2. How to find trains between 2 places (and availability). . . . . . . . . . . . 53
6.3. What Constitutes a valid ID? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
6.4. Tatkal or Urgent Tickets; A Longer Explanation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
6.5. A man, a woman and a dog. Is sex allowed on the Indian Railways? . . . 55
6.6. I NEED to get on that train. What should I do? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
7. Official Websites 60
8. Conclusion 60
A. The Indian Railways Network Map 61
B. Selected Train Fare Charts 62

B.1. Concession Train Fares . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
B.2. Rajdhani and Shatabdi Train Fares . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
C. Seat and Berth Layout on Coaches 67
D. Glossary 70
Index 72
GNU Free Documentation License I

List of Figures
1. Pre-Filled Reservation form . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2. The Railway Reservation Form . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
3. Break Of Journey Form . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
4. Reservation Chart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
5. Train Fares upto 1000 kms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
6. Train Fares more than 1000 kms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
7. Additional Fare Chart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
8. Cancellation Ticket . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
9. Second Class Compartments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
10. Sleeper Class Compartments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
11. Locating the Coach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
12. AC 3 Tier Compartments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
13. AC 2 Tier Compartments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
14. First Class AC compartments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
15. AC Chair Car . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
16. First Class Compartment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
17. Ticket Status on a Waitlisted Train . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
18. Ticket Status for a Prior Station . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
19. Changing the Boarding Station When Booking a Ticket . . . . . . . . . . . 58
20. Finding the Route and Availability for a Train . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
21. Indian Railways Network Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
22. Travel Concessions Part I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
23. Travel Concessions Part II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
24. Travel Concessions Part III . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
25. Rajdhani Express Fares . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
26. Shatabdi Express Fares . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
27. Berth Layouts for AC and Sleeper Class . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
28. Seat Layouts for AC and II Class . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
29. Seat Numbering for AC and Sleeper Class . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Acknowledgements
The following people have contributed enormously to this document. First, thanks to In-
diamike, without whom the site would not have been possible and the subsequent train
information therein. Thanks to the combined wisdom of the forum members who have
made the train section on Indiamike, the most comprehensive source of information for
travellers, second to the Indian Railways themselves.
In no particular order. . .
Indiamike, Mark Smith(Site owner of seat61), Steven ber, Shimla, Beach, Vsp27759,
Rangss, Cyberhippie, Dani.
If I have inadvertently omitted your name from the list above, please send me an email
and I shall correct the acknowledgements. And if you haven’t emailed your consent yet
to publish this material, please, please do so.
Note:As IndiaMike site is closed pending a sale, some of the forum members have
moved on to http: // www. theindiatree. com/ forum2/ site where they contribute
similar information. Further references, as of MAY 2006 will be to the members of
The India Tree unless otherwise noted.
Furthermore, I have no plans to changes the Title of the document, as it’s only fair, that
the document stays true to it’s origins and roots.
By the way, the document has neither official affiliation nor any sanction from the Indian
Railways.
All references to check the “site” should be taken to mean the Rail Forum
on the The India Tree forum

Revision Information
S.No Comment Date
1 Initial Version 20–03–2006
2 Changed location due to Indiamike site archival 06–05–2006

1. Introduction
This is an attempt to collect all relevant train related information in one place. All ma-
terial is from the site http://www.indiamike.com with some photos from the sites of
http://www.seat61.com1 and Wikipedia. You are encouraged to read this up and then
find the latest information by going to the site and following up on the Planes, Trains
and Automobiles thread.
NOTE:As of MAY 2006, the IndiaMike website has been closed pending a sale. The
new canonical location for finding the latest version of this document is Rail Forum on
the http: // www. theindiatree. com/ forum2/ website.
The information provided here is on a best effort basis and there is no implicit assur-
ance of accuracy of the contents presented herein. All copyrights lie with the individual
owners and posters subject to the GFDL.
While certain pieces of information presented here may quickly go out of date, it’s largely
a fairly good description of the organisation called Indian Railways. You will notice a lot
of errors in this document; Some are deliberate, some missed when proof reading and
some because I was too lazy to correct.
Seriously, the quirks in the document are because they’re almost verbatim copies of the
posts on Indiamike. Other than correcting glaring typos and grammatical errors(that I
know of), I have simply typeset it using LATEX 2ε and GNU Emacs.
If you’re coming to India, a little mastery over the Indian Railways will serve you well. In
the words of Jarman ah. . .
The moral to this story: do what the experts above have told you: get ALL
the information ready and in front of you before you start.. . .
Please note, there might be repetitions of certain texts in different parts of the document.
As this is mostly a verbatim copy of people’s posts, that is bound to happen.
1.1. How To use this Document

This document is best viewed in Acrobat Reader 6 or higher. This document is also
hyper-linked to pages inside and to external sites. You can also use the bookmarks
tab in the Reader and the TOC(Table of Contents) to navigate the document as they’re
hyperlinked to pages in the document.
First off, if you’ve not used the Indian Railways and/or is a first time traveller, read
everything in this document. Read it a couple of times, visit the Indiamike website to
see the latest postings regarding Train issues. Pretty much ALL your questions will be
addressed in this document or in the threads in the forums.
1
Many thanks to Mark Smith who provided permission to use his photos

2. Reservations
2.1. The Railway Reservation Form Explained
Author credit: Steven Ber
http://www.indiamike.com/india/showthread.php?t=7485
Railways There are 17 regional railways zones in India,

http://www.irfca.org/photos/Layouts/...map new?full=1
You should not have a problem if you leave this section blank, I don’t think booking
clerks will expect tourists to know which railway zone their money should be going
to.
Doctor Doctors should only tick this section if they are prepared to help if needed, there
is no discount on fares available unless you are an ’Allopathic’ Doctor and have a
copy of the registration certificate issued by the Indian Medical Council, then you
will get a 10% reduction in the fare.
Senior Citizen I believe this is the only concession extended to foreigners.

Men & Women aged 60 and above get a 30% reduction in basic fare on all Mail/-
Express & Rajdhani/Shatabdi trains; the 30% discount only applies to basic fare,
not the total fare; there is no discount available on reservation charge, Superfast
charge, or safety charge.
If you want the Senior Citizen discount, you have to write the word YES in the box.
A passport is ideal for proof of age, though this would also need to be carried on
trains as you will be asked to prove your age and penalised if you can’t.
Train name and number This section (along with the ’Date of journey’) needs extra
care to avoid any mistakes.
You can get the train name/number from the ’Trains At A Glance’ 2 timetable, it is
available at most large train stations in India, you can see it on the internet at this
website.
http://203.197.214.122/railways/timetable/home.htm
There is not a lot of space on the reservation form for the train name & number,
some of the train names can be long, so the following may help.
If a train is called ’Ahmedabad Howrah Express’ and you will be travelling towards
Howrah, just put ’Howrah Exp.’ (train number 8033)
2
Abbreviated as TAAG, sometimes in this document

So you would write 8033, Howrah Exp.

If a train has a particular name, for example ’Lokmanya Tilak (Mumbai) Trivan-
drum, Netravati Express’, just put ’ Netravati Exp.’ (train number 6345)
So you would write - 6345, Netravati Exp.
It’s the train number that the reservation clerk enters into the computer; the train
name is just to confirm that you haven’t made a mistake.
Date of journey You must use the British style Day, Month, Year, example 21/09/04
and not the American style Month before Day.
Date of journey should be easy, and it is if your getting a train that is ’daily’ and
has the same train number every day, thankfully most train’s fall into this category.
It becomes difficult when you want a train that only runs once a week and the
whole journey lasts 2 or 3 days.
The Himsagar Express departs Jammu Tawi once a week and gets to Kanyaku-
mari over 4 days later, the route of the train stretches over many timetables.
Lets say you wanted to take this train from Delhi to Nagpur, you find the timetable
for trains between Delhi and Nagpur, you look at the Himsagar Express, at the
top of the timetable, it shows that the train departs from its originating station
(Jammu) on Mondays, looking at the bottom of the timetable will tell you that the
train arrives at it’s destination station (Kanyakumari) on Fridays.
You would need to follow the train’s route carefully to find out that the train actually
departs Delhi on Tuesdays and gets to Nagpur on Wednesdays.
Unless your totally confident with timetables, ignore trains that are not Daily.
Class Classes of travel on Indian trains.

The abbreviations on the left (1A, 2A etc.) are the ones used in the ’all India’
’Trains at a Glance’ timetable, I have always used these on reservation forms and
have never had a problem, write the abbreviation of the class in which you want
to travel, next to the word ’Class’ on the reservation form.
1. 1A = First Class air-conditioned (AC1)

2. 2A = 2 Tier air-conditioned (AC2)
3. 3A = 3 Tier air-conditioned (AC3)
4. FC = First Class NOT air-conditioned
5. EC = Executive chair class, air-conditioned
6. CC = Chair class, air-conditioned

7. SL = Sleeper Class, NOT air-conditioned

8. 2S = Bookable second class seat, NOT air-conditioned
9. II = Unreserved 2nd class, NOT air-conditioned
An excellent description of how these categories will look like can be found here
http://www.seat61.com/India.htm
For a good descriptions of the idiosyncrasies of each class of travel, see Sec-
tion Knowing the Indian Train on Page 35
Number of Berths/Seats This refers to the number of paying customers (maximum 6)

Children below the age of 5 are not to be added to this section.
Children aged 5 – 11 travel at half the adult fare (paying the full reservation
charge), 12 years and above pay full adult fares.
Station from/to & Boarding at - Reservation up to This is the part that used to con-
fuse the hell out of me, you can ask three railway officials about it and receive 3
different answers.
If you are just doing a single journey, for example; Jaipur to Udaipur, Station
from would be Jaipur, To Udaipur, Boarding at Jaipur, Reservation up to Udaipur.
I believe the Station from/to refers to the train ticket, and the Boarding at - Reser-
vation up to refers to the reservation, it makes sense when your using the ’Break
of Journey’ rules.
If your going from Delhi to Howrah (Calcutta) and breaking your journey at Mughal-
sarai (for Varanasi) for a couple of days, the Station from/to section would be
for the ticket and would be Station From Delhi - To Howrah, but you would be
Boarding at Delhi with a Reservation up to Mughalsarai.
In the ’Onward/Return Journey details’ section further down the reservation form,
you would put the details of the second train, then Station From Mughalsarai, To
Howrah. Figure 1 on Page 11 explains it all a little more simply.
Using the ’break of journey’ rules in this example would cost Rs 1836 for the 2
trains (in 2A), single tickets would have cost Rs 2442, a saving of Rs 606.

Figure 1: Pre-Filled Reservation form

I have half-completed a couple of reservation forms to show how to

book a journey involving 2 breaks, in the following example the person
wants to travel from New Jalpaiguri to Jaipur with breaks at Varanasi
and Agra.
To do this, they would need to complete 2 reservation forms as follows:
-
The form shown in Figure 2 is the basic one to be filled in, with a break
as shown in Figure 3
The cost if you bought single tickets in 2AC = Rs 2857
The cost if you bought a ticket from New Jalpaiguri to Jaipur, and used
the ’break of journey’ rules would be Rs 1877.
This section can also be used to book a train from one town and then board it in
another town, this can be useful if the quota from your station has already been
used, but there are still berths available from the previous town the train stopped
at.
For example, If you are travelling from Hampi to Bangalore, you may find that
there is a waitlist from Hospet (closest station to Hampi), but there are still berths
available from Gadag, to book this way, do the following.
Station from Gadag, To Bangalore, Boarding at Hospet, Reservation up to
Bangalore.
You MUST put Hospet in the Boarding at section, otherwise the train conductor
will assume you have cancelled your trip and give your berth to someone with an
RAC (Reserved Against Cancellation) ticket.
You will have to pay the fare from Gadag to Bangalore.
Name To be completed in CAPITALS, if you have a long name just use the initial of
your first name.
Sex This part must be completed, just write a M or an F. Female passengers travelling
alone may ask for the ladies quota, which is available on certain trains (usually a
compartment of 6 in Sleeper class). it simply ensures that you’re co-passengers
are ladies.
Age This part must be completed, if your Male and 60 years old or above, or female
and 45 years old or above, have a look at the Choice section below.
Concessions/ Travel Authority No This section is only relevant to tourists if they are
using a Circular Journey Ticket or an Indrail Pass.

Figure 2: The Railway Reservation Form

Figure 3: Break Of Journey Form

Choice if any Choices of seats/berths are subject to availability, the earlier you book
the more chance you have of getting your preferred choice.
Men 60 years old or above, and Women 45 years old or above are automatically
given lower berths (subject to availability) even if they have not requested them.
Forward/rear facing is not an option, some trains change directions, though it is
intentional you’ll be pleased to know.
I find that I get my preferred choice about 50% of the time, though I normally book
trains only a few days before departure.
On the reservation form there is only the choice of lower or upper berths, I always
try for a side berth, I don’t know if I should be trying for a side berth or not, but
you don’t get if you don’t try, use the following abbreviations in this section.
1. LB = Lower Berth
2. MB = Middle Berth
3. UB = Upper Berth
4. SLB = Side Lower Berth
5. SUB = Side Upper Berth
Southern Railway’s timetable has some very good diagrams showing where par-
ticular seats/berths are on trains, most trains these days are broad gauge.
See the Appendix Section Seat and Berth Layout on Coaches on Page 67 for
more details about seating arrangements.
Children below 5 years (for whom a ticket is not to be issued) Children below 5 years
old travel free, however, there details MUST be added to this section of the reser-
vation form.
No seat/berth is provided for children who travel free.
If your child is below 5, it may be a good idea to carry something that would prove
their age.
Onward/Return Journey Details This section is for details of a second train (see the
Station From/To section further up the page)
Take extra care with the date in this section.
You can book a return journey on the same reservation form using this section,
but you will be charged for 2 single journeys and will get no discount.

Name of applicant Name of the person who will be holding the ticket on the train, (per-
son in line 1 of the ’name, sex, age’ section, NOT the name of a representative
who may be buying the tickets on your behalf.
Full Address and Telephone No Take care to put the correct Address & Telephone
number, sometimes around festival times Indian Railways officials check the valid-
ity of the passengers at random, contacting them at the address / phone number
given, this is to try to stop touts booking loads of reservations.
Indian Railways has some terrible delays and cancellations caused by fog in the
winter and by floods in the monsoon, I don’t know if Indian Railways tries to contact
ticket holders when trains are cancelled, if they do, they will need the correct
details.
Signature of the Applicant/Representative If you buy the tickets yourself, you have to
sign this section, if you send someone else to buy the tickets; they have to sign
this section.
The signature should be above the ’Date & Time’ sections.
Date Is for the date you are handing in the reservation form and not for the date of
travel.
Time Is for the time you are handing in the reservation form and not for the train de-
parture time.
Indian Railways use the 24-hour clock.
2.2. Tips
ALWAYS pick up a bunch of reservation forms whenever you see any, you never know
when you (or someone you meet) will need them.
Fill in the reservation form in your hotel room, it’s amazing how much simpler it seems
when you’re in a quiet place.
Find alternative trains for your route in case you can’t get reservations for your preferred
train; write down on a separate sheet of paper the train number/name of all alternatives.
Fill in a second reservation form with all details except train number/name and date of
journey; in case you can’t get reservations for your preferred train/day, it will then be
easy to add details of a new train AT THE RESERVATION WINDOW should you need
to.
Always be polite to the reservation clerk, he has a very hard job and sometimes gets a
lot of hassle from irate customers, a smile will get them on your side and it’s amazing
how helpful they can be, particularly when you can’t get your chosen reservation. If you

Figure 4: Reservation Chart
don’t get the seat/berth of your choice, have a look at the ’final reservation chart’ next to
the door of your carriage as shown in Figure 4, check the names of your fellow travellers,
you may find that there are a few members of the same family travelling together, they
may not have seats/berths next to each other, it may be worth offering to swap if it gets
you your preferred seat/berth, it worked for me once.
Computerised reservation offices are open from: -
Monday -Saturday 08:00 - 14:00 and 14:15 - 20:00.
Sundays - 08:00 - 14:00 only.
Though individual windows do close for ’lunch’, timings vary, though it’s normally just as
you get to the front of the queue.
They are open every day of the year, including National holidays.
2.3. Train Fares

Author: Steven ber
http://www.indiamike.com/india/showpost.php?p=34502&postcount=1
I will try to explain Indian train fares and how best to take advantage of the complex
rules, though I must confess; my knowledge of Indian Railway rules is not great, but I’ve
banged my head against that particular brick wall for long enough to learn some useful
things.
First, I will answer a question that I’ve been asked by a few members:
How do I budget for train costs?
The simple answer is: - you don’t need to!
Class of Accommodation on a train generally reflects a person’s budget; someone stay-
ing in a Rs 1000+ hotel will normally travel in air-con class on a train, an overnight
express train generally means covering about 650 km in 11 hours and the fare is Rs
742 for 3A and Rs 1138 for 2A.

Someone staying in a budget hotel would normally travel in Sleeper Class with no air-
con (Rs 283 for the same overnight journey).
So the cost of the train ticket is only what would have been paid on a hotel.
If you travel during the day you are not saving the cost of a hotel, but Sleeper Class
is fine for daytime travel (if you book side berths) and is only about Rs 160 for a 6 or
7-hour journey (about 350 km), or if you prefer air conditioned travel, the same journey
would cost Rs 325 in an AC Chair Car.
The typical train fare for travel under 1000km is shown in this Figure 5 and for those
more than 1000km is shown in Figure 6. For the Rajdhani and Shatabdi fares, please
see Section Rajdhani and Shatabdi Train Fares on Page B.2 There are additional
charges to be added to all the basic fares, most are indicated in the diagram at the
bottom of this post. It might also be worth considering that these numbers will vary as
the years roll by. Fares will be hiked, reversed or even stay the same depending on the
whims of the Indian Railways.
Certain sections of Indian Railways add a surcharge to help recoup construction or run-
ning costs, these areas include the Konkan Railway (Panvel to Kankanadi (Mangalore)),
most of the mountain railways (Kalka – Shimla, Siliguri to Darjeeling, Mettupalaiyam –
Ooty, Pathankot – Joginder Nagar, Neral – Matheran), I am sure there is a section
around Ambala (Haryana) that also has a surcharge, but I have no details about it.
The surcharge is added by multiplying the distance to be travelled, e.g.
• Konkan Railway – Actual distance X 1.4 = chargeable distance.
• Kangra Valley Railway - Actual distance X 1.5
• Kalka – Shimla - Actual distance X 2 (FC), Actual distance X 3 (II)
There is a full list of all the extra charges for these sections in Royston Ellis’s ’India by
Train’, If anyone has this book and forwards me the details, I will add them to this post.
As you will see from the fares tables, the further you travel, the cheaper the fare (per
km.), examples of this follow. (Additional charges not included)
The Himsagar Express (train 6317) starts from Kanniyakumari at the southern tip of
India, and arrives at Jammu Tawi 3 and a half days later, a ticket for the whole journey
of 3750 km would cost: -
• 2A = Rs 2729 (Rs 73 per 100 km)
• FC = Rs 2387 (Rs 64 per 100 km)
• SL = Rs 601 (Rs 16 per 100 km)
A more likely journey from Delhi to Varanasi (distance 764 km) would cost: -

Figure 5: Train Fares upto 1000 kms

Figure 6: Train Fares more than 1000 kms

• 2A = Rs 1137 (Rs 149 per 100 km)
• FC = Rs 829 (Rs 109 per 100 km)
• SL = Rs 253 (Rs 33 per 100 km)
A journey of 200 km from Mumbai to Pune would cost: -
• 2A = Rs 430 (Rs 215 per 100 km)
• FC = Rs 298 (Rs 149 per 100 km)
• SL = Rs 91 (Rs 45 per 100 km)
There are two ways to take advantage of the cheap long distance fares
2.3.1. Break of Journey Rules (B.O.J.)
A passenger holding a single journey ticket for any distance between 500 to 1000km is
allowed to break the journey once after covering a distance of 500km from the starting
station.
A passenger holding a single journey ticket for a distance of over 1000 km is allowed to
break the journey twice, the first break may be taken after covering a distance of 500
km from the starting station and the second break anytime thereafter.
Some rules to remember
1. A ’break of journey’ can be at any station (after 500 km) on route, and can last for
2 days, not including day of arrival and day of departure, meaning you can have 3
nights stay.
2. Your ticket needs to be endorsed by the Station Manager/Ticket Collector at the

station where you break your journey; the endorsement will consist of the Station
Code, Station Manager’s initials and the date.
3. Your ticket will be a single ticket from the starting station to your destination, but
you need to make reservations for all parts of the journey at the same time as you
purchase your ticket.
4. Break of journey tickets cannot be used on Rajdhani, Shatabdi or Jan Shatabdi

express trains.
5. Any stop to change trains at intermediate stations for less than 24 hours is not
considered a break of journey (this can be really useful).

Looking at a particular route, e.g. - Calcutta – Varanasi – Agra – Delhi (1450 km) can
show an example of the advantage of ’break of journey’ rules. (Additional charges not
included)
Single tickets in 2A = 1037 + 1026 + 430 = Rs 2493 (Rs 1676 using B.O.J. rules).
Single tickets in SL = 231 + 228 + 91 = Rs 550 (Rs 373 using B.O.J. rules).
Another route, Mumbai – Madgaon (Goa) – Ernakulam (Cochin) – Kanniyakumari.
Chargeable distance = 1960 km.
Single tickets in SL = 259 + 272 + 127 = Rs 658 (Rs 457 using B.O.J. rules).
Please see the Section The Railway Reservation Form Explained on Page 8 on using
the Reservation Form to book a ’break of Journey’.
2.3.2. Circular Journey Tickets (CJT)
A CJT is an extension of the Break Of Journey ticket, with no distance restrictions and
more flexible time restrictions, making it the ultimate cheap ticket on Indian Railways.
You are allowed a maximum of 8 breaks of journey and the CJT’s validity is distance
based.
You are allowed 3 days for every 400 km.
2000 km = 15 days,
4000 km = 30 days,
6000 km = 45 days,
and so on.
Although there are a number of standard set CJT’s issued by most regional train com-
panies, most of them are unrealistic, Southern Railways are the exception.
You can come up with your own itinerary, breaking your journey at any station for as
long as you want (though bear in mind the validity of the ticket).
Safety charge & Super fast charge (if applicable) need only be paid once; Reservation
charge is extra for each reservation.
A couple of examples: -
Delhi, Bundi (507 km), Udaipur (249 km), Ajmer (for Pushkar)(304 km), Jodhpur (246
km), Jaisalmer (294 km), Jaipur (607 km), Agra (358 km), Delhi. (200 km).
Total distance = 2765 km = 20 days.
Cost is worked out as follows: -
Total distance is halved, then fare for that distance is doubled, it’s easier to understand
if you think of it as a return ticket, then the normal additional charges are added.

Total distance is 2765 km, half of that is 1383 km, the cost for travelling in 2A for 1383
km is Rs1640, Rs1640 X 2 = Rs3280, add 1 X SF charge (if needed) Rs30, plus 1 X
safety surcharge of Rs80, plus 9 X reservation fee of Rs25 (Rs225), so total cost of this
CJT would be: -
2A = Rs 3615
3A = Rs 2365
SL = Rs 950
Another route, Chennai, Madurai, Varkala, Ernakulam, Udipi, Madgaon, Hospet (Hampi),
Mysore, Chennai. (Chargeable distance 3503 km, Validity 26 days) The total cost would
be: -
2A = Rs 4155
3A = Rs 2703
SL = Rs 1070
The real advantage of a CJT is when you’re travelling over long distances as the validity
increases, the following CJT is an example of this, and just shows how bored I was at
work today.
Delhi, New Jalpaiguri, Calcutta, Chennai, Trivandrum, Ahmedabad, Jaipur, Amritsar,
Delhi. (Chargeable distance 9246 km, Validity 69 days) The total cost would be: -
2A = Rs 6683
3A = Rs 4207
SL = Rs 1566
The problem with CJT’s is booking them, you have to take your itinerary to the station
master, he will go through it and decide if a CJT can be issued, he will most likely not
give his decision till the next day, you then go and buy your CJT then go and make the
reservations, If your lucky the whole process could take only a couple of hours, but 4
hours is more likely.
A few rules to remember: -
1. If the class of accommodation you have paid for is not available on a particular
train, you have to travel in a lower class or pay the difference to travel in a higher
class (if available).
2. You do not have to travel 500 km before the first break of journey.
3. You can’t go over the same route twice, unless there is no alternative.
4. You have to start and finish your trip from the same City.*
5. There are other rules, to many to mention, if you want to use one of these tickets,
reply to this thread with your Itinerary and I’ll work out if it will be allowed.

6. I think ’actual distances’ rather than ’chargeable distances’ are used for BOJ tick-
ets and CJT’s.
*Although the rules say that you must start and finish your trip from the same City,
nobody will force you to use the last leg of your ticket, although this would mean paying
for an additional journey. The additional cost would be small (% wise) and you would
get the added bonus of the whole ticket being valid for a longer period.
One little tip; -
If you want to travel a small distance, just buy a second class unreserved ticket, then
go and sit in Sleeper Class, you can pay the extra on the train, if Sleeper Class is full
you can stand or sit on the floor, but if Sleeper Class is full, you can be sure unreserved
second class is even worse.
This works particularly well on sections where many long distance trains are coming to
the end of their journey, a good example would be Agra to Delhi, there are long distance
trains passing through Agra every couple of hours, lots of people are getting off the train
at Agra leaving empty seats for the final leg to Delhi.
The following links are just to show what a difficult job a booking clerk has in India, the
list is just amazing.
Please see Section Concession Train Fares on Page 62 to see the different concessions
to which an Indian can apply for.
2.3.3. Additional Charges
The table below shows most of the additional charges that are added to the basic fare
to give the final ticket price.
M/E = Mail or Express train. (All the trains in ’Trains at a Glance’ or on the Indian
Railways website are Mail or Express or Superfast trains).
Ordy = Ordinary passenger train (not mail or express).
Minimum distance/fare Tickets will not be issued for less than these distances or
fares, however, a lot of the local railway companies have additional distance re-
strictions on certain long distance trains, If your travelling less than 200 km from
the originating station, chances are you will not be given a ticket for a long distance
train.
Reservation charge to be levied on every reservation made, however, Rajdhani and
Shatabdi trains have the reservation charge included in their fares.
Supplementary charge = Super Fast (SF) charge SF charge is added to all trains that
average more than 55 km per hour over the whole of their journey, (any Mail
or Express train whose train number begins with a 2), however, Rajdhani and
Shatabdi trains have the SF charge included in their fares.

Figure 7: Additional Fare Chart
Safety surcharge to be levied on every ticket (including Rajdhani and Shatabdi trains),
though the cost will not be shown on the ticket (the reservation and SF charges
are), Actual distance rather than chargeable distance is used to work out if your
journey is above 500 km.
2.3.4. The ’Value for Money’ Class
Author: Steven ber

Which is the best value for money class?
Classes of travel on Indian trains.
1A = F i r s t C l a s s air - c o n d i t i o n e d ( A C 1 )
2A = 2 T i e r air - c o n d i t i o n e d ( A C 2 )
3A = 3 T i e r air - c o n d i t i o n e d ( A C 3 )
FC = F i r s t C l a s s N O T air - c o n d i t i o n e d
EC = E x e c u t i v e c h a i r class , air - c o n d i t i o n e d
CC = C h a i r class , air - c o n d i t i o n e d
SL = S l e e p e r Class , N O T air - c o n d i t i o n e d (3 -t i e r )
2S = B o o k a b l e s e c o n d c l a s s seat , N O T air - c o n d i t i o n e d
II = U n r e s e r v e d 2 n d class , N O T air - c o n d i t i o n e d

A quick recap of different classes is shown again.

I believe Sleeper class is far ahead of all the other classes on a ’value for money’ basis,
however, It’s not that simple, It depends on many things.
I have no experience of Executive chair class, so can’t comment.
Although my preference is Sleeper Class (upper side berth), I have tried to be un-biased
with the scores that follow; I know that many will disagree with the scores.
The number in brackets (?) is my opinion of the relevant value for money. (10 = best, 1
= worst)
Sample fares - 1 = Delhi to Jaipur, 2 = Delhi to Mumbai. (not inc. reservation
charge)
First Class air-conditioned.
S a m p l e f a r e s - 1 = R s 1109 , 2 = R s 3 1 8 8 .
Overall - (5)
Journey over 12 hours - (6)
Journey under 12 hours - (4)
Overnight journey - (6)
Daytime journey - (5)
Busy/crowded train - (7)
Quiet train - (3)
Lower berth - (5)
Upper berth - (5)
Coupe (for 2 people) - (6)
Very hot weather - (6)
Acclimatising for trip to north pole - (10)
2 Tier air-con.
Overall - (7)
Quiet train - (6)
Lower berth - (7)
Upper berth - (8)
Side berth Lower - (6)
Side berth Upper - (6)

3 Tier air-con.
Overall - (8.5)
Quiet train - (7.5)
Lower berth - (7.5)
Middle berth - (7)
Upper berth - (9)
Side berth Lower - (9.5)
First Class NOT air-con.
Overall - (9)
(Compartment with 4 berths seats 6 during day & the
extra people that use it)
Quiet train - (8)
Lower berth - (9)
Upper berth - (9)
C o u p e ( f o r 2 people , 3 d u r i n g d a y ) - ( 9 . 5 )
Chair class.
S a m p l e f a r e s - 1 = R s 277 , 2 = R s 7 9 7 .
Overall - (7)
Journey over 12 hours - (4) (very rare)
Overnight journey - (3) (very rare)

Quiet train - (5)

Window seat - (7)
Aisle seat - (6)
Middle seat - (5)
Sleeper Class.
Overall - (10)
Daytime journey Quiet train - (10)
Daytime journey Busy/crowded train - (6)
Lower berth - (8)
Middle berth - (7)
Upper berth - (10)
Side berth Lower - (10)
(Side berths in Sleeper class are only 166 cms. long)
Bookable second class seat.
Overall - (7)
Overnight journey - (4) (very rare)
Quiet train - (6)
Window seat - (7)
Aisle seat - (6)
Middle seat - (5)
Unreserved 2nd class.
Overall - (6)


Quiet train - (8)
Window seat - (6)
Aisle seat - (4)
Middle seat - (3)
Floor - (2)
Luggage rack - (1)
None of the above - (0)
Finding out how a tinned sardine feels - (10)
All of the above scores are for broad gauge carriages, metre gauge scores may differ.
2.3.5. Is an Indrail pass worth the money?
Author: Steven ber

http://www.indiamike.com/india/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1795
An Indrail pass allows unlimited travel on Indian trains for tourists and non-resident
Indians (NRI)
Period of Validity and Fares in $US (1 $US = Rs 43.39 – 21st May 2005)
1 / 2 day , - -1A = 57 , - - - -2A = 26 , - - - -S L = 11.
1 day , - - - -1A = 95 , - - - -2A = 43 , - - - -S L = 19.
2 day , - - - -1A = 160 , - - -2A = 70 , - - - -S L = 30.
4 day , - - - -1A = 220 , - - -2A = 110 , - - -S L = 50.
7 day , - - - -1A = 270 , - - -2A = 135 , - - -S L = 80.
1 5 day , - - -1A = 370 , - - -2A = 185 , - - -S L = 90.
2 1 day , - - -1A = 396 , - - -2A = 198 , - - -S L = 100.
3 0 day , - - -1A = 495 , - - -2A = 248 , - - -S L = 125.
6 0 day , - - -1A = 800 , - - -2A = 400 , - - -S L = 185.
9 0 day , - - -1A = 1060 , - -2A = 530 , - - -S L = 235.
Children under 5 travel free, Children over 5 and under 12 travel for half the adult fare,
12 years and over pay full adult price.
Indrail Child passes available for half adult prices.
The best ’value for money’ Indrail pass is the 90 day pass, I have worked out the cost of
a 10,000 km tour of India not using an Indrail pass, I have included reservation, safety
and supplementary charges.

• 1A = First Class air-conditioned. (also includes executive chair class on Shatabdi’s)
• 2A = 2 tier air-conditioned. (also includes 3 tier air-con, First Class non-air-con

and air-con chair class)
• SL = Sleeper Class (not air-conditioned). (also includes unreserved ordinary sec-

ond class)
90 day Indrail pass costs:

1 A = U S $ 1 0 6 0 = R s 46 ,000
2 A = U S $ 5 3 0 = R s 23 ,000
S L = U S $ 2 3 5 = R s 10 ,196
A reasonable pace would allow for about 30 journeys in 90 days (allowing for many 1,
2 or 3 night stays at places, and 2 or 3 weeks at a beach).
With 3 months you will not need to do any ’long’ journeys, so a breakdown of 10 x
200km + 10 x 300 km + 10 x 500 km journeys seems appropriate.
The cost in each class is as follows:
1A = 9290 + 12,160 + 17,480 = Rs 38,930*
2A = 5250 + 6510 + 9250 = Rs 21,010*
SL = 1410 + 1740 + 2350 = Rs 5500
*The ’high speed’ Rajdhani (Capital City) and Shatabdi (Century) trains have some ad-
ditional charges over mail/express trains that are included in the cost of an Indrail pass,
i have not included the extra cost in the above prices as these trains are notoriously
difficult to book.
The following is my personal opinion, I know others will disagree and they are welcome
to add their comments.
In favour of the Indrail pass You can plan and arrange your whole holiday from the
comfort of your own home.
You never have to go through the (sometimes) hell of trying to get berths on a
train, if you book all your trains from home.
Air-Conditioned Classes are good value if booking all your trains from home.
Showing an Air-Conditioned Class Indiarail pass to an official can sometimes
magicaly make a berth available when all else fails.
An Indrail pass can be used when just jumping on a train for a short journey
without the need to buy a ticket.
The exchange rate with the US$ is making the Indrail pass better value for money.
(May 2005)

Against the Indrail pass You would need to travel by train regularly to get the benefit
from the pass.
They do cost more money.
Planning everything in advance is not always a good idea, you may like a place
more than you thought you would but have to move on, or dislike a place and be
stuck there for too long.
If you get ill it can ruin your plans.
You may not like the class of travel you have chosen to travel in (I personaly find
Air-con too cold and isolated from India).
If you are not planning the whole holiday from home you will still need to get
reservations for the trains you choose to travel on (getting reservations is the hard
part of purchasing tickets).
Queuing for tickets is part of the India experience and not that hard when you get
used to it
Not all useful trains are on the http://www.indianrail.gov.in/ website or in
’Trains at a glance’ so booking these trains is very difficult from home.
’Break of Journey’ rules(See Section Break of Journey Rules (B.O.J.) make buying
tickets in India much cheaper and they are easy to book, ’Circular Journey’(See
Section Circular Journey Tickets (CJT)) tickets are even cheaper, though a bit
harder to book, details of both can be found in the Train Fares Section Train Fares.
An Indrail pass is a ticket for the class of travel stated on the pass or any class of travel
below that stated on the pass, however, it does not reserve a berth.
You can just board a train and if a berth is available you will get it, if not you will have
to travel second class unreserved, but trust me, on a busy train you would not even get
into a busy second class carriage unless you need to practice your climbing skills.
Last year I was about 10 minutes outside of arriving at Mumbai CST when I saw an
express train that had just departed CST, there was just a mass of people lying on top
of each other rising to above the hight of the windows, I cannot ever imagine what these
trains must have been like at the time of partition.
Back to the pass, production of an air-con class Indrail pass can - as if by magic make
a berth suddenly become available, but then the same can be said for the production of
a couple of Rs 100 notes.
There is no advantage buying an Indrail pass unless you are reserving most, if not all
of your berth’s in advance, it is reserving a berth that is the hard part, not buying the
ticket.

If you are on a ’normal’ holiday period of 2 - 3 weeks reserving all your berths in advance
is OK, but anything over a month and you just can’t know how you will be feeling after a
couple of weeks in India.
Indian railways downgrades holders of half day, 1 day & 2 day Indrail Passes by 1 class
on the Rajdhani’s.
Meaning, if you wanted to travel 1A you would need to buy a 4 day pass, if you wanted
to travel 2A you would have to buy a 1A pass, though you could travel 3A by getting a
2A pass.
This only applies to half day, 1 day and 2 day passes on Rajdhani Expresses.
BTW, if the booked time of your train is 23 hours and 59 minutes you can use a one day
Indrail Pass, if the train is late the pass is still valid.
Longer period Passes start on the day of your first journey (that day becomes ’day 1’)
and ends at midnight on the last day your pass is valid.
An Indrail pass can be purchased at least 6 months in advance (I think it may be up to
a year in advance), also, reservations can be made at the time you purchase the Indrail
pass, this can be months before reservations are allowed in India, so there will be no
problem getting reservations on any train at any time of year. (As long as you book
more than 61 days ahead of your journey)
3. Cancellations
You simply complete the form giving all details of the cancelled journey, and hand it
over with the train ticket to be cancelled; you will then receive a ’cancellation ticket’, as
shown in Figure 8 on Page 33
A separate ’cancellation’ form is needed for each ticket being cancelled.
You only need to complete one cancellation form per ticket, even if 2 or more people
are on the original ticket.
I have cancelled tickets without filling in a cancellation form, not all reservation staff
asks for the form, but if you get to the front of the queue and they ask for one, you may
have to queue up again.
3.1. I-Ticket Rules

The information below is provided from the website http://www.irctc.co.in, so please
check there for the latest information on cancellation and refund rules. The refund rules
are for the tickets called I-Tickets which are the normal tickets bought over the counter
or Internet.

Figure 8: Cancellation Ticket
3.1.1. Cancellation of tickets before departure of trains
Cancellation of I-Tickets can be done at any computerised reservation counter across

the country and a cancellation ticket obtained. NO CASH REFUND will be given. Bank
charges that are being levied by the Payment Gateways/Banks are not subject to re-
fund in the event of cancellation of tickets by the Customer. Service Charge is also
not refundable. The refund amount will be credited to the respective account electroni-
cally, the following day of cancellation. Refund of fare shall be made after deduction of
cancellation charge of the fare as follows:
• If a RAC/waitlisted is cancelled then Rs. 20/- (Per Passenger) shall be deducted .
• If a confirmed ticket is cancelled more than one day in advance of the scheduled
departure of the train (excluding the day of Journey), cancellation charges shall be
deducted @ Rs.70/- for AC First Class/Executive Class, Rs.60/- for AC 2 Tier/AC
3 Tier/First Class/AC Chair car, Rs.40/- for Sleeper Class and Rs.20/- for Second
Class. Cancellation charges are per passenger.
• If a ticket is cancelled within one day in advance (excluding the day of journey)
and upto 4 hours before the departure of the train, cancellation charges shall be
25% of the fare subject to the minimum flat rate mentioned in the above clause.

3.1.2. Cancellation of tickets after departure of trains
I-Tickets can also be cancelled in the above manner, at the boarding station, within 4
hours before the scheduled departure of the train and
• Upto 3 hrs after actual departure of train for tickets upto a distance of 200kms
• Upto 6 hrs after actual departure of train for tickets upto a distance of 201-500kms.
• Upto 12 hrs after actual departure of train for tickets over a distance of 500kms.
In all the above cases, cancellation charges will be 50% of the fare subject to the
minimum flat rate mentioned in the above clause.
3.1.3. To cancel tickets after the above period
• Surrender the I-Ticket with the Station Master and obtain a Ticket Deposit Re-
ceipt(TDR).
• Prefer your claim for refund to the following address attaching the original copy of
the Ticket Deposit Receipt(TDR):
Jt.General Manager/Operations,
Indian Railway Catering & Tourism Corporation,
9th Floor, Bank of Baroda Building,
16 Parliament Street,
New Delhi - 110 001.
• IRCTC will process the refund claim with the Railway Administration and refund
granted by the Railway shall be credited to your account
• Refund claims under above clause may require at least 60 days or more for pro-
cessing.
3.1.4. Cancellation of I-Tickets in case of trains cancelled
I-Ticket can be cancelled upto 72 hrs after the scheduled departure of train at any
computerised reservation counter.
The above rules of Indian Railways are subject to change without prior notice

3.2. e-Ticket Rules

E-Tickets can be cancelled on Internet at this website till Chart preparation of the train.
Cancellations are not allowed at face to face Railway Counters. If the user wishes to
cancel his e-Ticket, he can do so till the time of chart preparation for the train (which is
normally 4 hours before the scheduled departure of the train from the train originating
station). He can log on to http://www.irctc.co.in/ and go to Booked Tickets link
and select the ticket to be cancelled and can initiate the cancellation by selecting the
passengers to be cancelled. However if the Identity Card holder in the original ticket
is selected for cancellation, all the passengers in the ticket would be cancelled and
a fresh reservation will have to be made, duly including the I’D particulars of another
passengers. Cancellation would be confirmed online and the refund would be credited
back to the account used for booking. If there is any partial cancellation of ticket please
ensure that a fresh e-reservation slip (Electronic Reservation Slip) is printed separately
as done for the original ticket.
For any claims on e-tickets to be cancelled after the preparation of Reservation charts,
the user has to send an email at the earliest possible time to etickets@irctc.co.in
giving full details of the ticket and stating the claim, which would then be processed by
IRCTC with the Railway administration offline and refunds as sanctioned by the Railway
administration would be credited back to the user’s account.
For further information please email us at care@irctc.co.in or call us at 011 - 23345500
/ 23344787 / 23344773
4. Knowing the Indian Train

Author:Beach
http://www.indiamike.com/india/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3164
Unlike the standard information approach typically you can see at the rail info site,
guides etc. Here I’m trying to take a hands-on approach on train travel in India to give
you a ’feel’ of it. Knowing the train and the system goes a long way in a comfortable
travel.
Here the train starts. . .
A typical long distance Indian train has the following coach configuration.
4.1. The engine(!)

in the front with the driver and his assistant. The ’Guard’ at the tail end of the train is
the overall in charge of the train. Trains run Diesel or Electric depends upon the route.

4.2. Second Class (General Compartment)

Generally, 2 to 4 coaches in a train, usually 2 just behind the engine and 2 at the end of
the train. You need not do any reservation for traveling in this. Just buy the ticket from
the counter at railway station even when the train is standing at the platform ready for
departure. This is the cheapest way to travel in India known to me. For about less than
10USD you can travel about 3000 kilometer (yes three thousand) eg. Trivandrum to
New Delhi. The catch is you will not have any seat reservation. No sleeping berth (you
have to sit and sleep for 2 nights). If you managed to get a seat there is no guarantee
that you can hold on to it. You need to ’reserve’ the seat you occupied by keeping your
luggage or any other personal objects on the seats when you go to toilets etc. An empty
seat is open for anyone including you to occupy!
The facilities are bare minimum. Food is available from the vendors. 4 toilets (squat
type) with water are attached to each coach. Fans are provided. Two washbasins are
also provided at both the ends. Bring a small chain and a pad lock to secure your lug-
gage beneath a seat or over the luggage rack. Depends on the season, route etc these
Figure 9: Second Class Compartments
may get overcrowded also. I’ve traveled many times in these during the overcrowded
seasons. A couple of times I had to breathe through the neighbor’s nose! These
coaches get phenomenally overcrowded during the Indian summer season. There is a
large a passenger overflow into second class from other classes due to the overbooking
of reservation.
You can see the poorest people of India in these compartments. If you want to get
a feel the raw India traveling by one of these is the best bet. People are generally
accommodative. People are more than happy to talk to strangers. A foreigner surely
generates a lot of curiosity.
You take the first step in winning the co passenger’s confidence. Use your common-
sense to judge the situation. The indication of their interest in you is that you will bom-
bard with a lot of curious questions. Be prepared to answer a lot personal questions.

The first would invariably about from where you are coming? What is your profession?
Then it could be how much you earn a month. Your answers can lead to sub questions!
This is how they socialize. Surprisingly they may not ask your name. They think this is
too personal a question to be asked! A poor Indian thinks that all the western tourists
are infinitely rich!! They have loads of money that they don’t know what to do with it.
Otherwise why should they travel around and waste a lot of money? It is surprising even
the well to do class in the Indian society also at times think in this line.
An average Indian is an infinitely inquisitive question bank. Don’t get offended. This is
how that culture is. Asking such questions is not considered impolite. Go with it rather
than fighting or get upset about it.
4.3. Sleeper Class (SL)

This class is the main chunk of a typical express train. About 72 passengers are ac-
commodated in each coach. There are about 10 to 15 coaches attached per train. You
need a prior reservation to get into these coaches. Reservations can be made at the
most 60 days prior to the travel date. Seats and made into berths in the night. The
seats are grouped into sort of semi private sections of 6 seats, 3+3 facing each other.
Upper berth (UB), Middle berth (MB) and the Lower Berth (LB). The lower berth is the
seat for the all the three during daytime.
Upper berth is undisturbed and can be used for sleeping even the daytime also. Lower
berth passenger gets the window seat during the daytime. Generally you can see a lot
of co-operation among the ’6 member berth family’ in berth swapping, setting the middle
berth etc during the travel. Then on the other side of the walkway there is a row of ’Side
Figure 10: Sleeper Class Compartments

Berths’. They are twin seats facing each other. If you are a tall person say more than
5.5 feet, these side berths are slightly short for sleeping. But both of these are window
seats and you will offer little trouble for the other passengers when getting out and go
for a small walk (remember the trouble you created for the mid and aisle passengers
sitting in your row during your flight!). Don’t get offended if an old passenger asks you if
you can exchange your lower berth with his upper berth. Generally the younger people
consent to this as a courtesy to the senior passenger. Try to avoid if possible first and
last 16 seats of the 72 seats in each coach. These are close to the doors and toilets.
You may be annoyed by the traffic near the door and toilets especially in the night due
to the light at this point. Just like the last row passenger’s trouble in an airplane.
Chains are provided to secure your baggage (bring your padlock). Your luggage can
be pushed under the seat. For about 14USD you can travel about 3000 kilometer eg.
Trivandrum to New Delhi.
These coaches are provided with 4 toilets (1 western style. Carry your toilet paper).
The squat type is more hygienic in a train. Using them in a running train needs some
experience. This is a stainless steel basin with footrest installed on the floor. Be careful
with small articles like spectacles, purse, toiletries etc, as this can be easily lost down
the drain if accidentally dropped on to the toilet floor. Once I’ve lost a key bunch acci-
dentally fallen from my pocket. Don’t forget to collect it back if you leave such articles
over the small shelf fitted inside the toilet near the mirror.
Unlike in the west you can use the toilet even when the train is at the stations also! No
one locks up them at stations.
There are two latches for the toilet. One is a twin latch that can be opened and closed
from both inside and outside. The other can be operated only from inside the toilet. Lock
this one when you are inside and leave the other one open. This gives the indication
from outside that it is occupied. Try to occupy only the toilets with the twin latch in the
closed position, meaning no one is inside.
Early mornings are a bit crowded at the toilets. You use the washbasin located outside
the toilet for brushing, face wash etc. The toilets are more or less similar for all the
classes.
Your name is listed on the chart stuck next to your coach’s door outside. A copy of the
same is displayed at the departing station “Reservation Chart” notice board also about
and hour before the departure.
These coaches are indexed as S1,S2,. . . S10. Lookout for a square white paper label,
(See Figure 11) stuck on the side of the door with the coach number marked on it.
Note: In the Picture, it’s the red wooden tab on the top of coach; most times
you’ll find a white paper with the Number printed there.
The same is printed on your ticket also. Most of the stations have a notice board indi-
cating the position of the coaches from the engine. If this is not displayed ask any staff

Figure 11: Locating the Coach
you see on the station for your location. If you could find out the location of your coach
prior to the arrival of the train you can avoid those mad running up and down along
the length of the train with your huge backpack. Bring your own bedroll for the II class
sleeper travel. A thick blanket and an air pillow is not a bad idea.
The middleclass mass of India travel by this class. Next to your seat will be a newly
married Tamil couple (who can speak reasonably good English), An old lady (who is
not very happy with you in the beginning), her middle-aged daughter (who speak only
Hindi) and her inquisitive young boy (who want to know where are you from). For a
budget traveler Second Class sleeper is THE most suitable mode of transport.
4.4. AC 3-Tier Sleeper (3A)

This is the AC version of the Second Class Sleeper. Most of the express trains have
about 2 to 3 coaches of this type. More comfortable than Second Class Sleeper and
also a bit more spacious. The windows are covered with the non-open able tinted glass.
You may not be able to enjoy the sights outside like in the Second Class Sleeper.
For approx. 34USD you can travel about 3000 kilometres e.g. Trivandrum to New
Delhi in this class. This is recommended if you need to travel in a bit comfortable way
especially during the summer. Bedroll available inside the coach free of cost. Most of
the facilities are comparable with the Sleeper Class.
Here again you will find the Indian middle class as your co passengers.
Don’t get upset if someone requests to share the magazine you have been reading.
This is a very common practice in Indian trains. After reading a magazine if you have
kept it beside you some one will just take it to have a look. And from him this goes to a
third person without anybody’s permission. The magazine will enjoy a mini reading tour
within the compartment and return to you through the same trail. For a newspaper the

Figure 12: AC 3 Tier Compartments
story is still more dramatic. If you are reading the news headline, someone will hold the
middle papers are pull it gently! You are expected to release the tight hold so that he
can pull out the middle section of the newspapers easily. This is treated as absolutely
courteous! Here again the newspaper travel in loose sections and comeback to you
after a well read tour.
Generally people won’t request your books for reading. If you are a ’selfish’ person keep
your magazine inside your bag immediately after you read it.
4.5. AC 2-Tier sleeper (2A)

Many express trains have a couple of this class coaches. Luxurious than the 3A. At
a cost of about 48 USD you can travel about 3000 kilometer eg. Trivandrum to New
Delhi in this class. You can find the well to do Indian class in these coaches. This is a
good asylum for those who cant join the crowd or expect luxury than economy. All the
facilities available in SL is available here also. Bedroll available inside the coach free
of cost. Like in any other AC coaches here again you can’t enjoy the outside view due
to the dark window glass. Tell that coach attendant to reduce the CHILL if you feel that
you are inside a freezer with berths & wheels!

Figure 13: AC 2 Tier Compartments
4.6. First Class AC (1A)

The highest luxury class in the regular routes.
Cost comparable with economy class airfare. For about 150 USD you can travel from
Trivandrum to Delhi. A number of important long distance trains have these coaches.
The elite class and business executives travel by 1A. Once I’ve met a businessman in
Figure 14: First Class AC compartments
this and he said he is afraid of flying and therefore travel only by train. You can travel in
this train for days without even having eye contact with the co passenger. People tend
to mind their own business (the usual stuff of newspaper reading, staring at the laptop
screen, acting sleepy etc). This peculiar difference I’ve noticed almost in all of my train
journeys.
The personal interaction barrier increases with increase in luxury! Somebody tried to
explain that this is due to the physical distances in the luxury classes. In a Sleeper

class you are more physically close to the co passengers and this increases the drive
to interact with others.
4.7. AC Chair car (CC)

Generally attached to the day running trains only. Looks more like an economy class
seat in the plane. A bit wider seat but. Cost a bit less than the 3A. OK for a decent day
travel. Many day running express trains have this class.
Figure 15: AC Chair Car
4.8. First Class (FC)

This is the legacy first class coach. Only a few meter gauge express trains have this.
This is first class but non-AC! Cost between Second class AC and Third class AC. Spa-
cious. You need to inform the station in charge prior to get inside the train for a bedroll.
Cost Rs20 per bedroll. There are a number of special trains called Rajdhani (means
capital) and Shatabdi (means centenary) express. These trains have only the luxury
class coaches. And they are the fastest of all trains in India. Rajdhani Expresses run
between Delhi and many important cities .Shatabdi Expresses run between important
cities. Shatabdi is a day running (no sleeping berth) train. Domestic airlines are their
main rivals!
4.9. Brake Van

These are the luggage van attached at the end of each trains. If you have any JUMBO
size articles (bicycle, Motorbike, camping equipment. etc) you can carry in the same
train you are traveling.

Figure 16: First Class Compartment
Luggage need not have to be booked along with your reservation. Just come to the
boarding station a bit earlier than the departure time and book the luggage in the break
van. Luggage Office is located near the platform. You need to show the ticket as proof
that you are traveling in the same train. Go personally to the break van to supervise the
loading and unloading of your luggage. This helps you to avoid any ’miss’.
Even if you are not having any thing to put in the luggage van and your luggage is more
than the free allowance you need to pay the additional charge at this office.
Typically the frees allowance are 35kg for second class, 40kg for II Sleeper & III AC
sleeper, 50kg for II AC sleeper, 70kg for I AC. About 10kg more than this is OK. If you
exceed above that the extra luggage charges to be paid.
4.10. Pantry Car

Most of the long distance trains have this facility. You can get meals, snacks, coffee, tea
(chai), cool drinks etc in this. Staff comes to your seat with supply. Also you can go the
car and order directly. You need to pay for what you buy.
This is basically a vegetarian facility with egg omlate (I don’t know the exact spelling).
Chicken curry + meals available at stations for about a USD per head. Prices are slightly
higher for food than the local restaurants. You can get a decent food in an express train.
4.11. TTE
You have to show the ticket to the TTE (Traveling Ticket Examiner) on request. He
wears a dark blazer with a name badge over his white shirt and always carries a chart
board with a huge clip over it. He talks the native version of English!

You can see a beeline of passengers behind him at the beginning stations asking him
questions about the status of their waitlist.
You can ask him any questions from swapping your seat to the next coach where your
friend’s berth is, arrival & departure ’timings’, which train is the best to reach Shimla.
How many children he has (you will be appreciated!) etc etc.
If you want to extend your journey in the same train he can do the same and give you
the receipt. He can also upgrade your class based on availability and you can pay and
get the receipt during the journey itself.
If there is a medical emergency within the train inform the TTE. He along with other key
staffs are trained to administer the first aid. Also he can easily locate any doctors from
the passenger list.
Indian railways encourage Medical practitioners to prefix their name with Dr. when doing
the reservations. All the passengers are insured by the railways against accidents within
the railways premises as per the rules.
Typically a TTE is in charge for about 4 coaches. He travels along with you. For very
long distance trains a new TTE takes charge every day. He locks the coaches from
inside during the nights. Many night running trains have a few policemen as night
guards. For any complaint or request during your travel approach the TTE.
4.12. Vendors
Any thing is available for sale inside a train and at stations.
From safety pin to quiz books to banana to shoe polishing service to dried fruits. . . you
name it! But all of them may not be the railways approved vendors.
A train is a big bazaar on the move. They are the part and parcel of the system. When
a train reaches a station the vendors cover the windows like bees on the honeycomb,
everyone shouting what they sell. All the services are thoughtfully customized that it
can be easily sold through the 4inch or so gap of the window grille!
If you are sitting at the window seat a co passengers may request to pass their buy.
Generally the train stops for two minutes at a station.At key stations this can be up to 30
minutes. Shift your huge backpack close to the exit door when trains is about to reach
your destination .
All frenzy activities of buying, selling, getting in getting out takes place in two minutes
time before the train slowly start with a long whistle. Carry a bunch of coins and small
changes during travel.

4.13. Reservations over Internet

You can do it yourself at any of the Indian Railway reservation counters in India. There
are 100s of them all around the country. Cities have such counters located at multiple
places for the passenger convenience.
Booking from abroad is a bit difficult affair if you are totally new to the whole scheme of
things. Through Internet you can directly book most of the trains.
But you have to collect the ticket manually from the office near the Delhi railway station.
These tickets need not be for the trains originating from Delhi. You need to produce
the proof such as the credit card used to book the ticket copy of passport etc. Your
representative can also collect the ticket if you can give an authorization letter with
details and a copy of your passport. Presently only at Delhi this collection facility is
available.
But tickets can be couriered to many important towns in India. Lists of such towns are
listed in the site. They don’t courier abroad. You need to provide a local address to
collect these tickets (a friend, hotel (check with them beforehand), an institution etc).
Also you need to allow about 2 to 3 days as delivery time. Extra service charge (1.8%)
is levied on the total cost of ticket for Internet booking of tickets.
You have to do a small online registration at the railway site before enabling you the
booking. VISA and Master Cards are accepted. Refund is made on the card if you
cancel the ticket later. Note down the 10 digits PNR and the Transaction ID. You can do
a maximum of 4 bookings a month. Each ticket can be for a maximum of 6 passengers.
It is possible to check the availability status of seats before you go to India over the net
to get an idea about it. There is an Indiarail pass available for foreign tourists. This is
available abroad. If you are not traveling so much this is not worth.
Larger hotels in India have travel desk attached to it. They collect about Rs30 per seat
for standing in the queue and booking it for you. This is an easy way to book tickets if you
are not curious to go to the reservation counters personally and stand in queue. There
are special quotas for foreign tourists. Enquire about this at the reservation enquiry
counter for availability in your route. Counters are open 8.00am-8.00pm weekdays and
8.00am-2.00pm on Sundays.
When searching for the availability of a particular train you may encounter a result like
WL 40/WL 10. This may look a bit confusing for a new user.
If you know the Indian reservation system this is a useful bit of data. There are two
kind of waiting list in Indian trains. Seats(with berth) are reserved on a first come first
served basis. Once this is over you are under the ’ Reservation against Cancellations’
category popularly known as RAC.
This is nothing but a waitlist in the conventional sense. You can still get inside a train
with an RAC status ticket. You are having a confirmed seat. But the berth will be allotted
based on the availability due to the cancellations. After such ’seat only ’ seats also got

over booked the real waitlist (WL) come into picture. WL40/WL10 means your actual
waitlist position is 40th .Due to the cancellations of tickets booked before you the current
status of your waitlist position is reduced to 10. In other words 30 bookings are already
cancelled before your enquiry/reservation (40-10=30).
Now you may ask why should you know how many seats got cancelled?
Good question.
Based on the experience a regular traveler knows how many sets get cancelled in a
route. A bit chancy issue. But about 200+ seats get cancelled for a Second class
sleeper for train. You can take a chance accordingly.
When you are searching for the seat availability if you come across with something like
AVAILABLE- 0068 means 68 seats are available for the day indicated.
Check the status of your ticket just before getting inside a train if you are having a
RAC or WL ticket. You can do this through internet, reservation enquiry counter or
phone (Interactive Voice Response System ),You can see the telephone numbers at
the reverse of the ticket.
You need to use the 10 digit PNR printed on the upper left hand corner of the ticket.
You will not have a seat allotted for you if the status is still under the WL. Contact the
TTE for knowing your chance of getting a berth. However you can travel with this ticket
in the General Compartment.
4.14. Cancellations
You can cancel a reserved ticket and get the refund across the reservation counter.
Generally the cancellation charges vary from less than 1/4 USD to slightly more than a
USD depends on the class.
If you cancel a reservation at least a day (excluding the day of travel) before the start of
journey only the cancellation fee mentioned is charged.
If you cancel within one day but 4hours before the train departure 25% of ticket cost
plus the abovementioned cancellation fee is deduced in the refund amount.
You can cancel the reservation even after the train has left without you! But the refund
amount varies accordingly. Typically you will loose about 50% of the ticket cost.
For a waitlisted ticket no the cancellation fee is charges if cancelled in advance.
A chart for this is displayed at all the reservation counters showing various refund %
based on class, time of cancellation, distance etc.
Tickets reserved at one station can be cancelled at another location also. If you have
booked over Internet or through credit card the refund will be credited only to your card
account. Lost ticket will not be refunded.
You can get a duplicate for a lost or torn ticket if you know the details such as the 10
digits PNR and other details. A charge from 10% to 25% is collected based on the

distance for the duplicate ticket. And if you got back the original you can claim the
refund of additional money you paid for it with a 5% charge! Produce both the tickets at
the reservation counter.
For cancellation and reservation of tickets the same form can be used.
4.15. Tatkal Scheme

This is an emergency reservation scheme introduced in selected (about 100) trains.
Such trains are indicated with a T at the end of their train number.
The reservation for these seats starts just 24 hours (8am to be specific) before day of
journey 3 . These are in fact the same express trains with 2 or 3 such special reservation
coaches attached to it.
All the Tatkal (means immediate) tickets come with a premium of Rs50 to 200 extra
depends on the class. You need to produce a photo identity card (passport, Driving
license, Credit card etc) at the reservation counter. The same will be asked for in side
the train also by the TTE. The ID number is noted on the ticket. This is basically to
prevent the bogus booking and black-market sale of hot tickets! If you are booking the
Tatkal for a group of people (max 6 per ticket) any one member’s ID is sufficient.
These tickets can’t be cancelled for refund. This is really a boon for the emergency
passengers.
You can use the Credit cards also for booking tickets at the reservation counters. Look-
out for the special Credit Card counters at the reservation office. You need to pay Rs.30
additionally as service charge. But generally the credit card queues are shorter than
the pay cash queues. Use your discretion.
5. Booking Indian Rail tickets from abroad

Almost all the regular train tickets of the Indian Railways can be booked over the net. A
few points needs to be kept in mind to avoid any confusion later on. Even though you
can book from abroad, this service is mainly addressed to the domestic passengers. In
other words they do not deliver the tickets abroad.
How does the overall scheme work?
You select the train & book the tickets over the net. Pay with the credit card. Tell them if
you will collect it personally or they need to deliver to the address given by you. In 2 to
3 days the ticket will be delivered to you to the India address by courier. As simple as
that!
3
Now extended to 3 days before day of travel

5.1. Registration
To start with you need to do a small (not too small!) registration with the railways
reservation site. You need to provide a bit of personal data and addresses. No credit
card details are asked at this point. You need to give both residential and office address.
You have an option of selection the address for delivery. Also if you have given an
address at the time of registration and your ticket needs to be delivered at a different
address, it is possible (to give a different delivery address) at the time of booking the
ticket.
(Note: PIN is Postal Index Number, the six digit Indian postal code. It will be asked
during the registration and booking)
Obviously most of the details asked for are straightforward. Still a few more points
needs to be remembered to make it easier & successful.
The address area is the one where you may find some trouble. First of all please
remember that you need a paper ticket printed out by the railways to travel by the
train. The ticket you booked online is send to your address by courier. And the agency
(IRCTC) doesn’t send the tickets abroad.
So whatever the (foreign) address your are entering here are practically for the official
record purpose & NOT for sending your ticket to this address. But if the address you
enter here are the Indian ones, you can chose to get your tickets delivered to this
address.
One more additional point to note is that, each time you actually book your ticket you
are given an option to enter the delivery address. This need not have to be the address
you have entered during the registration.
In short don’t worry so much about the address you enter during the registration pro-
cess. You can keep entering new ’Indian Addresses’ as and when you are on the move.
The most convenient ’Indian Address’ for the ticket delivery is the Hotel where you would
be staying on your arrival in India. More of it is discussed at the other threads on online
booking.
Quick tips
1. The site login expires in 20 minutes (if inactive). So be fast on site by keeping all
the details handy.
2. The site works from 4 AM to 11.30 PM (Indian time) . Indian Time = London Time4
+ 5:30 hours.
3. Always use a 6 digit PIN/Zip
4. You can choose a ticket delivery address each time you book online.
4
For the nitpickers it’s GMT; happy Nick-H?

5. Keep an Indian delivery address handy (with the correct PIN Code) when you
book the ticket.
6. Enable a pop-up blocker when visiting the site
5.2. Plan the Travel

You need to know three things at the first screen of booking.
• From & To stations
• Date of travel
• Class of travel.
Indian railways identify each of its stations with 2 to 4 alphabet codes. (For example
New Delhi – NDLS, Whitefield – WFD).If you are not sure of the code there is a small
yellow icon next to the field. Click this and enter the text name known to you. For
example if you enter DELHI, a list of stations with codes in bracket would appear. Pick
the one you want.
A word of caution: Many of the Indian towns have two names (at
least!). Railways have officially accepted only one of it. So if
you are searching be aware of this fact. Search will not give
result if you are not searching the official name. Mostly one name
is the local name and the other is the English
name.
At places the English names are official and at others it is the local name.
Chennai (MAS) is the official name of Madras (English)

Quilon (QLN) (English) is official name of Kollam
Varanasi City (BCY) is the official name of Banaras (English)
Note the codes. They are derived from the English name and always
the local name need NOT be the official name.
It takes about 2 to 3 days to deliver the tickets. So never select a date, which is too close
to the date of booking. In other words book well in advance. You can do it a maximum
of 60 days in advance.
Select the class of travel. See my earlier post ’Knowing the Indian Train’ in Sec-
tion Knowing the Indian Train on Page 4 if you need to know what each class ’feel’
like.

Once you’ve done with the above, the site give you list of probable trains, which suit the
details, you have given. At this point you need to be a bit ’knowledgeable’ about each
of the trains. For example some may be super fast trains, some may be regular express
trains. . . etc. A number of important trains are listed by Steven at ’Train Information’ at
the same sub forum.
One easy way is to explore each of the trains there itself at the site. You may select
each of the trains and press the keys [Get Fare] or [Show Availability] or [Show
Route] etc. The comparison of fare would give you an idea about the type of the trains.
Also this will show you the explanations of the charge that would be collected from you.
The availability chart list the reservation status for as few nearby days of your selected
travel date. If it looks full, you may select the next available date of go for a different
train. The Route key will give you the full list of stations it cover with the ’Timings’ of
arrival and departure at each stations.
Also note that there are may weekly, bi-weekly express trains.If the date selected by
you does not coincide with the train’s schedule, it will not be listed.You may miss that
train even before it has started!
Once you have selected the train, you would be taken to the next page for filling further
details. See if the details accepted are the same desired by you. Enter the boarding
point station. This is a confusing point !
What is the difference between From station and Boarding point?
In all most all cases the Boarding point for you will be same as the From Station. From
and To stations can’t be changed once the reservation is made. But later on if you plan
to board the train from different station on the route, you can do that without loosing the
reservation status. Just go to a PRS (Passenger Reservation System) counter with the
ticket a and give a request to change the boarding point. No charges are collected for
this. In other words they will wait for you up to the boarding station in the train before
the seat is marked absent and allotted to the next waitlisted passenger.
Select the Quota General or Ladies. There are special quota seats allocated for the
female passengers. (In India females are called ladies!)
Do not put a tick at the Senior Citizen check box, if you are not an Indian Citizen 5 !
There is a 30% concession for people above 60 years old for long distance fares. You
need to carry some proof showing both age and nationality during the travel.
Enter the name, Age, Sex and Berth choice details asked for all the passengers. You
can book a maximum of 6 passenger per ticket.
Now you need to tell them if you will collect the tickets personally (only at New Delhi
at present) or to be couriered to you at the local address given by you. At this stage
you can give any local added here. Select the City listed and give the PIN code. You
SHOULD have the PIN known to you for giving the address of delivery. Once you have
5
This might not be true,even older foreign nationals might be eligible

entered the City, Click the ’Pin Code covered for delivery ’ to see if your pin code is
listed there. As a thumb rule almost all the Cities and even mid size town are covered.
No big worry on this as long as you know the PIN code of your address.
Typically people give the local hotel’s address. A local friend’s address, a local office,
an institution known, another travel colleague already in India etc are viable options.
Some Hotels do this service with a nominal charge. Checkup with them before you give
the address.
If possible you can opt for collecting the tickets personally also. You need to produce
the details like the PNR & Transaction ID. Also the proof of identity to be produced. The
credit card used to book the ticket is OK. Alternatively, you can authorize someone else
also to collect the ticket on your behalf. A letter from you a photocopy of the passport
are sufficient for them the collect the ticket on your behalf.
A nominal fee is charged by the railways as service charges (for courier etc) and 1.8%
of the total cost is charged if you are using credit card. A host of other payment options
are listed. But if you are doing from abroad, VISA or MASTER cards are the most viable
options.
You would be asked the card details like any other online payment processes.
Once you have booked, you will be given the Transaction ID and the 10 digits PNR
(Passenger Name Record).
PNR is the most important code in tracking the status of your ticket etc at any later
stage.
Please Note: You cannot cancel online6 . The ticket needs to be collected and produced
at the reservation counters for cancellation. Online-booked tickets can be cancelled and
the refund will only be credited to the account used to book it. This is a safety precaution
as no one else can misuse it.
Foreign quota tickets cannot be booked online.
There are some limitations on the number of tickets (each with a maximum of 6 persons)
that can be booked per month for each user name.
You need to have the physical ticket with you to board the train. This is the only accepted
document within the train to claim the reservation.
5.3. Website Connection Issues

Author: Rangss
This from the IR website http://www.indianrail.gov.in:
“The online PNR and seat availability queries are fetched from the computerized reser-
vation applications, which are open to public from 08:00 hrs. IST to 20:00 hrs IST on
6
Applicable to I-tickets

weekdays and from 0800 hrs IST to 1400 hrs IST on SUNDAYS. These online reserva-
tion applications are shut down daily around 2300 hrs IST and booted around 0500 IST
hrs on weekdays. On SUNDAYS the shutdown is done earlier”
Due to the dynamic changes taking place in the PNR status updation and the availability
positions, these two types of queries have to be fetched from the online reservation
applications, hence the non- availability of them after certain timings. The sheer size of
these databases does not allow them to be copied over network lines.
“. . . for the PNR and seat availability queries, the result is fetched from the computerized
reservation applications at the five sites, viz. New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai
and Secunderabad. If there is any network link failure, or if the network lines are very
congested, then this error message is displayed. It might so happen, that you are
getting seat availability and PNR information for say trains originating from New Delhi
and Kolkata, but not for trains originating from Mumbai.”
6. Miscellaneous Info
6.1. Luggage Allowances
Author: Steven Ber
You are allowed the following free allowance and (marginal allowance) per person.
1. Air Con First Class = 70 Kgs (+15 Kgs)
2. 2-tier air con = 50 Kgs (+10 Kgs)
3. First Class (non air con) = 50 Kgs (+10 Kgs)
4. 3-tier air con = 40 Kgs (+10 Kgs)
5. Air Con Chair Class = 40 Kgs (+10 Kgs)
6. Sleeper Class (non air con) = 40 Kgs (+10 Kgs)
7. 2nd. class (non air con) = 35 Kgs (+10 Kgs)
Children aged 5 and below 12 years are allowed half of the free allowance up to a
maximum of 50 Kgs.

6.2. How to find trains between 2 places (and availability).

If you have to research the trains before you book your travels, then the best way is to
go to this site.
http://www.indianrail.gov.in/inet srcdest names.html
Then do the following. . .
• Source Station Name : = Delhi (or any other station)
• Destination Station Name : = Pathankot (also try Chakki (for Chakki bank), an-
other station in Pathankot) (or any other station)
• class = all class (or the class you want to travel in)
Then click on Get It.

When you get to the next page, click on Get It. again.
(When your not sure of the spelling for a particular station, just enter the first 3 or 4
letters, when you click on ’Get It’ you will be given a choice of stations to select from)
Find the train you want, (not all are daily), then click on the circle next to the train
number.
Click on the class you would like to travel (unless you already chose a class on the first
page), then go back up the page and enter the date you would like to travel.
Quota should be general quota though you can also look for foreign tourist quota.
Then go to the bottom of the page and click get availability
If you want to see a few different dates for the same train, do not select a date, the site
will give you the availability for the selected train for the next 6 times it runs, and then
the next 6 and so on.
This site can be slow
6.3. What Constitutes a valid ID?

IR accepts the following as valid ID
• Voter Identity Card
• Passport
• PAN card
• Driving License
• Central / State Govt. issued Photo ID card.

6.4. Tatkal or Urgent Tickets; A Longer Explanation

The rules may change at any time and the latest rules can be found here at this website.
http://www.indianrail.gov.in/tatkal.html
Highlights of the tatkal scheme
• To meet the urgent travel requirement of the passengers who plan their journey at
short notice, Tatkal reservation facility be provided in the train
• Tatkal booking opens at 8AM on the previous day of the journey. This period has
been enhanced to three days. For example in respect of train leaving on 4th,
Tatkal Booking will Commence at 8AM on 1st. This Change has been effected
W.E.F booking commencing 14th November 2005.
• There will be Tatkal quota in each train in 2A, 3A, AC Chair Car and sleeper
classes as under
1. 2A 4 berths per coach
2. 3A 6 berths per coach
3. AC CC 6 seats per coach
4. SL 10% of the accommodation on one coach whichever is less
• The unutilised Tatkal quota will get released to waitlisted passengers.
• Tatkal charges have been revised as under
Timings
Classes Non Peak Peak
15th July to 15th September

(Fares in Rs.)
2 AC 200 300
3 AC 200 300
AC CC 75 150
SL 75 150
• The reservation under this scheme shall be available only upto the time of prepa-
ration of charts
• For the purpose of granting refunds & issuing TDRs, the time limit will be the same
as applicable for refund of normal tickets
• The booking under tatkal scheme will be done only from originating to terminating
point of the train with boarding facility from intermediate station

6.5. A man, a woman and a dog. Is sex allowed on the Indian Railways?
That got your attention, didn’t it?
Actually, the question should have been, how should I book a coupé? But that would
have been boring, wouldn’t it? I’ll let Steven ber answer. . .
If you are a couple and you want a coupé (separate compartment for only 2 people) in
non air con First Class (FC) or air conditioned First Class (1A), tell the reservation clerk
that you will be bringing a small dog on the train with you.
The rules say that you can take a dog on a train ONLY in FC or 1A provided you “reserve
either a 2-berth or a 4-berth compartment exclusively for your own use”.
The charts (indicating berth/cabin allocation) for FC & 1A are prepared 4 hours before
the trains departure, so by the time you board the train you will already have been
allocated a coupé, just tell the man on the train that you decided to leave the dog
behind.
There is a Rs30 charge for a “small” dog.
You can definitely leave the dog behind, unless you want to take the dog (“small”) with
you and. . .
6.6. I NEED to get on that train. What should I do?

Right, that means we are desperate. The following are your options depending on what
you can bear in terms of cost, comfort and peace of mind.
Option I The simplest and the most desperate way would be to turn up at the station
on the day of travel and simply buy a ticket. You need to be there before the
train is shunted into the platform and buy the ticket. Say, the train departs at 1600
hours; be in the station by 1300, buy your ticket for General Class by standing in
the line where the daily / platform tickets are sold. 7 Then find out which platform
the train will depart from and the location of the General compartments and wait.
You will need to be quick and jump in as the train is being shunted at around 1530,
say, and ’reserve’ a seat in the scrum.
The porters on the platform will have a good idea about when the train is shunted
in and a small tip to him will also ensure HE books a seat for you in the General
Compartment.
This works only if you’re trying to get in at the start of the train journey i.e. at the
very first station. If you’re getting in somewhere in between source to destination
station, most probably you’d not even be able to get inside the General Compart-
ment. Other things to consider are the distance to be travelled, travelling single,
7
Usually, the reservation counters are different from the counters which sell the daily tickets

with or without luggage and time of travel. Summers can be ferocious and being
packed in like sardines is not going to help your mood. Anything more than a
couple of hours, again, is going to drain you by the time you get off. In the holiday
season, it gets worse.
This is recommended if and only if, you’re desperate(get out of Dodge mode) and
have more than a passing familiarity with the Indian Railways.
Option II The Tatkal scheme is another option and the time window is now three days.
You need to book your tickets within this time window by paying the full fare. De-
tailed explanation can be found in Section 4.15, Tatkal Scheme and in Section 6.4,
Tatkal or Urgent Tickets; A Longer Explanation. Remember, you’re not the only
one with an emergency.
Option III OK, this is a more complicated example and Steven has already covered it
before. I’m going to try explaining this with pictures. Sometimes, if you’re not able
to get a ticket booked from station A to station B because it is waitlisted or there
is a regret indication, try booking from a station prior to station A. As there is a
quota for each leg (as divined by IR), booking from a previous station but boarding
at a different station may be allowed.
As an example, I’m trying to go to Kumbakonam from Bangalore on the 9th of
April. Trying to book on the 4th of April, what do I see? I’m already on waitlist and
Figure 17: Ticket Status on a Waitlisted Train

the WL number makes it unlikely that I’d get a confirmed or even a RAC ticket. In
the Figure 17, please note the following
1. SBC, station code for Bangalore City Junction

2. KMU, station code for Kumbakonam
3. SL, Sleeper Class booking
4. Source Station
5. Destination Station
6. Train Number
7. Train Name
So, it appears, that I cannot get on the train in Bangalore.

What happens if I try to book a ticket from Maddur, a station before Bangalore?
A quick look at the availability shows that there’s plenty of tickets as can be seen
from the screen-shot in Figure 18. So, clicking on Book Ticket link on the screen,
Figure 18: Ticket Status for a Prior Station
one is led to the data entry screen where you enter your personal preferences for
travel. On this screen, as seen in Figure 19, note the Boarding Point link; click
on that to get the list of Stations for that Train 6232, the Kumbakonam Express.
Choose Bangalore from the pop up window and click OK. Complete the rest of

Figure 19: Changing the Boarding Station When Booking a Ticket
the form and submit the form. Effectively, you’ve booked from Maddur to Kum-
bakonam but boarding the train at Bangalore. Of course the fare would be a little
bit higher as you’re paying from Maddur, instead of Bangalore.
But how do I know the stations list for this train route and why did I choose Mad-
dur?
That’s easy, you see the options as shown by screen grab in Figure 20? You
iterate through the list of stations till you hit a station for which tickets are still
available. Click on the Show Route link to get the stations and the 3/4 letter
codes. Plug that code into the main screen and click on Show Availability link
to get the pop up which gives you the seat availability. Work your way backward
through the list of stations prior to Bangalore(in this example) till you hit a station
offering a seat/berth. Of course, I choose Maddur because it’s the first station
Figure 20: Finding the Route and Availability for a Train

before Bangalore and I obviously would not like to pay a very high fare for parts
of the journey which is not useful for me. I mean, I could have booked from Mysore
with boarding at Bangalore but it gets me no advantage as I pay the full fare when
I get the same confirmed berth for a lesser price from Maddur which is 1 station
prior to Bangalore.
Bear in mind the following. . .
1. If you’re boarding at the first station and it’s already on WL then you’re out
of luck! That is, in this example Kumbakonam Express starts from Mysore,
so there’s no chance of this type of skullduggery. Yeah, I know, it’s sooooo
obvious. Best is to try Tatkal or travel unreserved!
2. Don’t forget to fill in the boarding point correctly! If you fail to do that, the
TTE will assume that you’re a ’no show’ and will allocate the seat/berth to
another passenger. And he’s well within his rights to do so! Check your
ticket, it will say something like, From Maddur TO Kumbakonam, Boarding at
Maddur. Unless you explicitly mention while booking that the boarding point
is different( that is Bangalore), it will be assumed to be from the place where
the From field says.
3. Logically, you can also do this from a later station, say Tiruchirapalli but you’ll
have to travel in General Compartment till that point and also get a ticket
from Bangalore to Tiruchirapalli! Obviously, you can’t book from Tiruchi to
Kumbakonam, pay only that small fare but get in at Bangalore. This will only
make sense for 1 or 2 stations downstream. And this scenario is also highly
unlikely because if your current station is fully booked out, most probably the
downstream stations are too.
And by the way, you can’t change the boarding point to Bangalore when
booking if your From station is Tiruchirapalli, the pop up will only show sta-
tions downstream of Tiruchirapalli! Yeah, IR seems to have plugged that
devious workaround.
4. I have shown it from the web interface. While physically booking at the
counter, you can ask the clerk there for a ticket from a prior station if he
says it’s wait listed for your station.
I’m not sure of this information but I think that stations on a route are bunched
into buckets and have ticket quotas associated with them. In the example above,
when I checked, all the stations from Mysore to Maddur had the same number of
open tickets and those from Bangalore downstream were all having the same WL
position.

7. Official Websites
The following are the official websites of the Indian Railways which users may require
to look up and book tickets.
1. http://www.indianrail.gov.in/
2. http://www.irctc.co.in/
3. http://www.srailway.com/
4. http://203.197.214.122/railways/timetable/home.htm
5. http://www.indianrail.gov.in/inet srcdest names.html
8. Conclusion
While no means exhaustive, this document with all it’s errors contain enough material
for you to make a hash of it when you book your first tickets. Seriously, this document
is only part of the story, as it’s just a front for all the experiences of different people
who travelled by Indian Railways. It is a reflection of missed trains, obtuse bureaucracy,
random observations and sometimes serendipitous discoveries by people of different
nationalities.
My contribution pales in comparison to their dedication and energy in posting their find-
ings about travelling on Indian Railways.
May their tribe increase.
n
This document was written with FSF GNU Emacs with LATEX2e and pdftex generating
the final output.
) digital.drifter@gmail.com

A. The Indian Railways Network Map
Figure 21: Indian Railways Network Map
Magnify at greater than 300% to read the text of the Network Map!

B. Selected Train Fare Charts

B.1. Concession Train Fares
This will not be applicable to foreign tourists, except the senior citizens category. Proof
required to claim that concession when travelling. If not, a fine is levied by the TTE.
This is mentioned for completeness as this is applicable to Indians only.
Figure 22: Travel Concessions Part I

Figure 23: Travel Concessions Part II

Figure 24: Travel Concessions Part III

B.2. Rajdhani and Shatabdi Train Fares
Figure 25: Rajdhani Express Fares

Figure 26: Shatabdi Express Fares

C. Seat and Berth Layout on Coaches
Figure 27: Berth Layouts for AC and Sleeper Class

Figure 28: Seat Layouts for AC and II Class

Figure 29: Seat Numbering for AC and Sleeper Class

D. Glossary
BOJ Break of Journey; type of ticket which allows one to get off the train when
you’re tired of sitting
CJT Circular Journey Ticket; type of ticket slightly different from BOJ, allowing for a
planned route with the start and end station being the same
FC First Class
GFDL GNU Free Documentation License
IR Indian Railways
LB Lower Berth, 184 cm. long and 55 cm. wide
MB Middle Berth, 184 cm. long and 55 cm. wide
PAN Permanent Account Number, the Indian Income Tax ID used to file taxes but
very few do. But you get a shiny new number though
PIN Postal Index Number, a 6 digit number required when booking tickets online for
the address in India
PNR Passenger Name Record, a 10 digit number crucial to your travel especially
when you’re WL/RAC
PRS Passenger Reservation System,(another name for the computerized

reservation centre)
RAC Reservation Against Cancellations, you can get on the train but you only get a
berth shared with another RAC passenger till the TTE deigns to allot a berth to
you
SF Super Fast trains, a Science Fiction train in Indian Railways but if you locate
one, let us know
SLB Side Lower Berth, 166 cm. long and 55 cm. wide
SUB Side Upper Berth, 166 cm. long and 55 cm. wide
TAAG Trains At A Glance;The Railway Timetable book
TDR Ticket Deposit Receipt; important piece of paper to get your refund

TTE Travelling Ticket Examiner, also known as God when you don’t have a
confirmed ticket
UB Upper Berth, 184 cm. long and 55 cm. wide
WL Waiting List, you can’t get on the train if you’re still waitlisted, on the day of
Travel. But you can go to the General Compartment and join the crowd

Index
abbreviations booking
berth, 15 tatkal, 54
class, 9 break of journey, 10, 12
Acrobat Reader reservations, 21
requirements, 7 rules, 21
address ticket, 21
hotel, 51 not applicable, 21
office, 48 budget, 17
residential, 48 Bundi, 22
Agra, 12, 22, 24
Ahmedabad, 23 Calcutta, 22, 23
Ajmer, 22 cancellation
Ambala, 18 charges, 46
Amritsar, 23 e-ticket, 35
form, 32
Bangalore, 12, 56–59 rules, 32
Beach, 5 bank charges, 33
bedroll charges, 33
bring, 39 confirmed, 33
free, 39, 40 day, 33
pay, 42 RAC, 33
berth service charge, 33
abbreviations, 15 time, 34
children, 15 waitlisted, 33
LB, 15 ticket, 32
Lower, 37 charge
MB, 15 Super Fast, 24
Middle, 37 supplementary, 24
SLB, 15 tatkal
SUB, 15 premium, 47
swap, 17 chart
UB, 15 availability, 50
Upper, 37 final, 17
berths, 10 preparation, 55
boarding point, 50, 57, 59 reservation, 17, 35, 38
book Chennai, 23
Royston Ellis, 18 children
72
age, 10 position, 38
details, 15 Cochin, 22
fare, 10, 15 concession
CJT, 22 basic fare, 8
actual distances, 24 foreigners, 8
advantage, 23 senior citizen, 8
breaks, 22 Copyright, 1
chargeable distances, 24 coupé
class, 23 book, 55
cost credit card, 51
example, 22 booking, 47
days, 22 counters, 47
finish, 23 MASTER, 51
minimum distance, 23 service charges, 51
problem, 23 VISA, 51
route, 23 Cyberhippie, 5
Safety charge, 22
standard issue, 22 Dani, 5
start, 23 Darjeeling, 18
Super fast charge, 22 date
class British style, 9
1A, 9 Delhi, 9, 18, 22–24, 26, 41
2A, 9 discount
2S, 10 senior citizen, 8
3A, 9 doctors, 8
AC1, 9 Allopathic, 8
AC2, 9 dog, 55
AC3, 9 charge, 55
CC, 9
e-ticket, 35
EC, 9
email, 35
FC, 9
rules, 35
general, 55
telephone, 35
II, 10
emergency, 47, 56
SL, 10
engine
Sleeper, 26
diesel, 35
value for money, 25
electric, 35
coach
Ernakulam, 22, 23
number, 38
Express
ticket, 38
Himsagar, 9, 18

fare prefill, 16
additional charges, 18, 24 reservation up to, 10
advantage, 21 return, 15
break of journey, 21 senior citizen, 8
budget, 17 sex, 12
children signature, 16
free, 29 station from/to, 10
full, 29 Telephone, 16
half, 29 time, 16
comparison, 50 train name, 8
concession types, 24 train number, 8
minimum distance, 24 travel authority no, 12
more than 1000km, 18 forms
Rajdhani, 18 tips, 16
rules, 17
sample Gadag, 12
scores, 29 General Compartment, 36, 59
Shatabdi, 18 general compartments, 55
surcharge, 18, 25 GFDL, 7
calculation, 18 Goa, 22
places, 18
Hampi, 12, 23
under 1000km, 18
Hospet, 23
fares
Howrah, 8
sample, 26
Calcutta, 10
form
address, 16 I-Tickets, 32
age, 12 ID
applicant, 16 Driving License, 53
boarding at, 10 Passport, 53
cancellation, 32 valid, 53
children, 15 Indiamike
choice, 15 Acknowledgement, 5
class, 9 Indiarail pass, 45
concessions, 12 Indrail, 29
date, 16 IRCTC, 34, 35, 48
date of journey, 9
doctor, 8 Jaipur, 12, 22, 23, 26
name, 12 example, 10
onward, 15 Jaisalmer, 22
Jammu, 9

Jan Shatabdi, 21 Nagpur, 9

Jarman ah, 7 name
Jodhpur, 22 english, 49
Joginder Nagar, 18 local, 49
journey towns, 49
cancel, 32 Neral, 18
onward, 10 New Delhi, 36, 38, 40
return, 10 New Jalpaiguri, 12, 23
no show, 59
Kalka, 18 number
Kangra, 18 coach, 38
Kanniyakumari, 18, 22
Kanyakumari, 9 office
Konkan, 18 holidays, 17
Kumbakonam, 56, 58, 59 timings, 17
online registration, 45
LB, 37 Ooty, 18
login, 48
luggage pantry, 43
allowance, 43, 52 pass
children, 52 Indrail, 29
proof, 43 child, 29
van, 42 cons, 31
articles, 42 downgrades, 32
example, 29
Maddur, 57–59 pros, 30
Madgaon, 22, 23 purchase, 32
Madurai, 23 validity, 32
map, 61 value for money, 29
Network, 61 Pathankot, 18
Mark Smith, 5 PIN, 48
Matheran, 18 length, 48
MB, 37 PNR, 45, 51
meals, 43 porters, 55
medical emergency, 44 proof
Mettupalaiyam, 18 age, 50
Mughalsarai child, 15
breaking, 10 nationality, 50
Mumbai, 21, 22, 26 passport, 8
Mysore, 23, 59 tatkal, 47

PRS, 50 seat
Pune, 21 availability, 51
Pushkar, 22 avoid, 38
choices, 15
quota swap, 17
foreign, 51 seat61, 5
general, 50 seating arrangements, 15
ladies, 12 Second Class, 36
tatkal, 54 budget travel, 39
cheapest, 36
RAC, 45
facilities, 36
confirmed seat, 45
Shatabdi, 21, 24, 25, 30, 42
railways zones, 8
meaning, 42
Rajdhani, 21, 24, 25, 30, 32, 42
Shimla, 5, 18
meaning, 42
Siliguri, 18
Rangss, 5
site
refund
timing, 48
claim
Sleeper Class, 37, 57
address, 34
seat, 37
credit, 33
snacks, 43
rules, 32
Station Manager, 21
charges, 33
stations
tatkal, 47
code, 49
reservation
Steven ber, 5, 50
cancel, 46
charge, 24 TAAG
included, 24 site, 8
counters, 45 timetable, 9
close, 17 tatkal, 47, 54, 56, 59
timings, 45 booking, 54
emergency, 47 charges, 54
enquiry, 45 identity proof, 47
hotel meaning, 47
travel desk, 45 quota, 54
status, 50 reason, 54
tatkal, 47 time window, 54
time, 47 unutilised, 54
window, 37 website, 54
rules TDR, 34, 54
tatkal, 54 ticket

availability, 57 description, 10
cancel, 46 connections, 53
cancellation, 32 Express, 24
location, 46 Mail, 24
collect, 50 name, 8
couriered, 45 number, 8
delivered, 48 Ordy, 24
delivery time, 45 RAC, 12
Deposit Receipt, 34, 54 search, 53
duplicate, 46 Superfast, 24
emergency, 47, 56 travel dates, 53
extra service charge waitlist, 12
Internet, 45 trains
foreign tourists, 45 alternatives, 16
limitations, 51 bi-weekly, 50
lost, 46 daily, 9
maximum number, 45 weekly, 50
original, 47 Trivandrum, 23, 36, 38, 40, 41
quotas, 59 TTE, 43, 59
special quotas, 45 duties, 44
status, 45, 46 questions, 44
PNR, 46, 51
unreserved, 24 UB, 37
Ticket Collector, 21 Udaipur, 22
tickets example, 10
abroad, 47 Udipi, 23
cancellation unreserved, 59
rules, 32
Varanasi, 12, 18, 22
Tiruchi, 59
Varkala, 23
Tiruchirapalli, 59
Vsp27759, 5
toilets, 36
paper, 38 waiting list, 45
squat, 36 website
western, 38 link failure, 52
Train open, 51
quota, 12 shut down, 52
train timings, 52
availability, 53 websites, 60
classes, 9 Wikipedia, 7

WL
travel, 46

Last Upd:May 6, 2006 I
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Status:Draft III Ver: 1.01

Last Upd:May 6, 2006 IV
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Status:Draft IV Ver: 1.01

Last Upd:May 6, 2006 V
G. Preserve in that license notice the full lists of Invariant Sections and required
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dorsements of your Modified Version by various parties–for example, statements of
Status:Draft V Ver: 1.01

Last Upd:May 6, 2006 VI
peer review or that the text has been approved by an organization as the authoritative
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Last Upd:May 6, 2006 VII
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Status:Draft VII Ver: 1.01

Last Upd:May 6, 2006 VIII
10. FUTURE REVISIONS OF THIS LICENSE

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dation.
Status:Draft VIII Ver: 1.01

Indian Railway Guide

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Indian Railway Guide

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Indiamike Guide to Indian Railways

The IndiaMike, The India Tree Members

When all else fails, read the instructions --/usr/bin/fortune

Status:Draft 1 Ver: 1.01

4. Knowing the Indian Train 35

Status:Draft 2 Ver: 1.01

5. Booking Indian Rail tickets from abroad 47

A. The Indian Railways Network Map 61

B. Selected Train Fare Charts 62

C. Seat and Berth Layout on Coaches 67

GNU Free Documentation License I

Status:Draft 3 Ver: 1.01

Status:Draft 4 Ver: 1.01

Status:Draft 5 Ver: 1.01

Status:Draft 6 Ver: 1.01

1.1. How To use this Document

Status:Draft 7 Ver: 1.01

Railways There are 17 regional railways zones in India,

Senior Citizen I believe this is the only concession extended to foreigners.

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So you would write 8033, Howrah Exp.

Class Classes of travel on Indian trains.

1. 1A = First Class air-conditioned (AC1)

Status:Draft 9 Ver: 1.01

7. SL = Sleeper Class, NOT air-conditioned

Number of Berths/Seats This refers to the number of paying customers (maximum 6)

Status:Draft 10 Ver: 1.01

Figure 1: Pre-Filled Reservation form

Status:Draft 11 Ver: 1.01

I have half-completed a couple of reservation forms to show how to

Status:Draft 12 Ver: 1.01

Figure 2: The Railway Reservation Form

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Figure 3: Break Of Journey Form

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Figure 4: Reservation Chart

2.3. Train Fares

Status:Draft 17 Ver: 1.01

• Konkan Railway – Actual distance X 1.4 = chargeable distance.

• Kangra Valley Railway - Actual distance X 1.5

• Kalka – Shimla - Actual distance X 2 (FC), Actual distance X 3 (II)

• 2A = Rs 2729 (Rs 73 per 100 km)

• FC = Rs 2387 (Rs 64 per 100 km)

• SL = Rs 601 (Rs 16 per 100 km)

Status:Draft 18 Ver: 1.01

Figure 5: Train Fares upto 1000 kms

Status:Draft 19 Ver: 1.01

Figure 6: Train Fares more than 1000 kms

Status:Draft 20 Ver: 1.01

• 2A = Rs 1137 (Rs 149 per 100 km)

• FC = Rs 829 (Rs 109 per 100 km)

• SL = Rs 253 (Rs 33 per 100 km)

A journey of 200 km from Mumbai to Pune would cost: -

• 2A = Rs 430 (Rs 215 per 100 km)

• FC = Rs 298 (Rs 149 per 100 km)

• SL = Rs 91 (Rs 45 per 100 km)

2.3.1. Break of Journey Rules (B.O.J.)

2. Your ticket needs to be endorsed by the Station Manager/Ticket Collector at the

4. Break of journey tickets cannot be used on Rajdhani, Shatabdi or Jan Shatabdi

Status:Draft 21 Ver: 1.01

2.3.2. Circular Journey Tickets (CJT)