IRCTC Latest News Today: Union Minister of Railways Ashwini Vaishnaw on Friday said the Centre will soon pass an order to cancel some special trains and a decision will be taken to announce normal ticket fare on regular trains. Speaking to News18, the union minister said that nearly 95% of the express trains are back on track and 25% of these trains are still being operated under the “special category”.
He said that the railway passengers travelling on these trains are needed to pay 30 per cent extra fares. He added that the Railways Ministry has decided that it will halt these special trains soon.
He added that the railways had started operation of trains in special categories under covid protocols and the whole purpose was to control and limit the crowd in trains.
The Railway Minister further stated that about 70 percent passenger trains have been given the status of mail express due to which the passengers have to pay more fare to travel in these trains. He also said that the order issued during covid will be withdrawn to facilitate the public.
It must be noted that the Indian Railways has been operating special trains with full reservation across the country since the pandemic time and the passengers travelling in these special trains will have to pay 30 percent extra fare as compared to the normal trains.
Nearly 1700 mail express trains were running before the pandemic and those trains had to be halted due to COVID situation, but the railway administration has resumed most of these trains as the corona cases subsided.
It must be noted that around 3500 passenger trains were running before the Corona hit the country and the number is still low as nearly 1000 passenger trains are currently operational.