Don't we all understand the pain of an unconfirmed train ticket? Have we not all spent a month tediously planning for that pending reunion, only to find that the tickets never got confirmed? This could, however, soon change. A report in Times of India mentioned that passengers with unconfirmed AC-I or AC-II tickets for the Rajdhani Express could soon opt to fly with Air India instead, after paying the price difference, in case there is any.
AC-II fares for Rajdhani Express are more or less similar to air fares. Moreover, this could solve the issue of low occupancy in Air India as well as of high demand for Rajdhani tickets.
In fact, last year ticket fares of the country's premium tarins, Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duronto, shot up the base fares by 10 per cent, to accrue more revenues. According to the dynamic fare system, for the first 10 per cent of the tickets sold, the fares would remain same, after which for every 10 per cent tickets sold, the prices go up by 10 per cent. As reports mention, this earned the railways an added Rs 240 crore.
The current Chairman of the Railway Board, Ashwani Lohani, came up with the ticket-switch plan last summer when he was the Chairman of Air India. However, the railways had not reacted in a positive manner, the report mentions. Now that he is heading the Railway Board, he says that the railways would accept this proposal if Air India approaches them with this.
Lohani's plan mentioned that contact details of people whose tickets remain unconfirmed could be shared with Air India, who could then offer them seats on flights for the same destination, with competitive prices. When Lohani initially came up with the idea, Air India had also decided to match fares with AC-II for important metro routes, such as Delhi-Mumbai.
However, with Air India moving towards privatisation, it remains to be seen if this can be implemented.
BT Online New Delhi Last Updated: October 23, 2017 | 12:09 IST 
