Tejas passengers fume over ₹20 collected for newspaper, water
Ananth.MK@timesgroup.com
20.12.2021
Commuters in Tejas express are unhappy over not giving them a choice to opt out from paying ₹20 extra for the railways to provide them with the copy of a newspaper and a bottle of water. Sixty-four-year-old T M Murthi who had travelled from Chennai to Madurai in the train wrote to the railway minister about it and southern railway has offered an explanation.
Murthi, AICTU general secretary for Tamil Nadu, said that he travelled on Saturday and found a bottle of water and a newspaper on the seat allotted to him. “The TTE examined my ticket and demanded ₹20 for the water bottle and newspaper. It is unjust to ask for what I did not ask for. The TTE showed the passengers' list in which he was instructed to collect money,” he said. The TTE left without arguing with him but continued to collect the same from other commuters.
Southern railway on Sunday offered an explanationstating that the additional charge is collected in line with the Railway board policy for premium trains such as Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duronto, in return for provision of packaged drinking water and newspaper. In view of the pandemic, catering services, supply of drinking water and newspapers were suspended.
These services have been introduced with effect from December 17, 2021. Hence the ticket checking staffs have been instructed to collect the excess fare of ₹20 from passengers who have booked their tickets prior to December 16. Thereafter advance payment of catering charges was enabled on IRCTC portal to facilitate online booking of catering services for such passengers.
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