The Indian Railways earned over Rs 2,800 crore in the last seven years from child travellers after revising child travel fare norms, an RTI response revealed.
For the financial year 2022-23 alone, the railways earned Rs 560 crore from the change in norms, making it the most profitable year, the response from the Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS) under the Right to Information (RTI) Act showed.
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It is to be noted that on March 31, 2016, the Ministry of Railways announced it would start charging full adult fare for children aged 5 and under 12 years if they opted for separate berths or seats in a reserved coach.
The amended norm came into effect on April 21, 2016. Earlier, children between 5 and 12 years were offered separate berths at half the travel fare.
Children between the abovementioned age group are still allowed to travel at half the travel fare if they are accommodated on the seat of the adult accompanying them.
As per the data provided by the CRIS, in the last seven years, over 3.6 crore children were found to have travelled paying half fare without opting for a reserved seat or coach, while over 10 crore children opted for a separate berth/seat and paid the full fare.
The CRIS, an organization under the Ministry of Railways, gave the data from the financial year of 2016-17 to 2022-23 of two categories of children based on their fare options in a tabular form.
Recently, the railways has directed all its zones to maintain the time and punctuality of all mail and express trains across the network. The railway board has directed to deploy officers at major terminals for round-the-clock monitoring to ensure the punctuality of the trains.
The development comes at a time when MPs are reaching New Delhi via train to attend the special session of Parliament.
