Rlys to send SMS alerts

New Delhi: The Railway Budget provides a caring touch in the form of quotas in lower berths for the elderly and women, special coaches for the handicapped, cushions on seats in second class and increasing the number of unreserved general coaches on trains.

Technology is also to be used to try and eliminate the TTE’s ability to hawk vacant berths, though the rail minister didn’t quite put it that way. TTE’s on some trains will be given hand-held terminals with which they are supposed to inform the reservation system about any berths/seats going vacant once the train leaves its originating station. This will mean that stations down the line can move waiting list passengers to fill these vacant berths rather than giving the TTE the ‘discretion’ of disposing of them.

There will also be a single call centre number across the country — 139 — to provide information on arrivals, departures, seat availability and the like. This call centre will also provide SMS alerts, and if things go according to plan, even services like ticketing, taxi booking and hotel booking in the future.

Railway safety and security find passing mention in Lalu’s speech, but the larger provisions for the Railways’ depreciation reserve find should in the long run enhance safety by boosting the funds available for replacing or upgrading aging infrastructure. On the security front, chastened by the Mumbai and Panipat blasts, the Railways are planning to enhance surveillance through increased use of CCTVs, more dog squads, explosive detection devices and so on. About 8,000 vacant posts in the Railway Protection Special Force are also to be filled up.