As Indian Railways resumed ticket booking on Monday (May 11, 2020) it sold tickets worth ₹10 crore to 54,000 passengers within hours of opening the portal. The Indian railway has allotted 30 special trains as it resumes operation after almost two months due to the coronavirus scare.
The IRCTC website began booking tickets for travel on special trains after 6 pm, two hours behind the schedule due to a technical glitch but all AC-1 and AC-3 tickets for the Howrah-New Delhi train were sold within the first 10 minutes.
Fifteen pairs of special trains will be carrying passengers from one destination to another. The trains will run from New Delhi railway station to other cities including Mumbai, Bangalore, and Chennai.
Eight trains will start on Tuesday — three from New Delhi to Dibrugarh, Bengaluru and Bilaspur. The rest will start from Howrah, Patna, Bengaluru, Mumbai Central and Ahmedabad for New Delhi. All the trains will only have air-conditioned coaches.
The India Railways also issued new guidelines for traveling on these special trains from Tuesday (May 12), asking passengers to carry their own food and linen and arrive at stations at least 90 minutes before departure for health screening.
According to the timetable issued by the Railways, the trains will run either daily, weekly or bi-weekly from May 12 to 20 as of now. There are no trains scheduled on May 16 and May 19.
Bookings will be available only on the IRCTC official website and no booking can be done through ‘agents’-both IRCTC agents and Railway