An important rule has come into effect for railway passengers from January 5. Now it has become more difficult to book reserved tickets through IRCTC account without linking it to Aadhaar. From today i.e. from January 5, such users will not be able to book tickets online from 8 am to 4 pm. This rule will be applicable only on the first day of opening of reserved ticket booking.
It has been told by the Railways that booking of reserved tickets opens 60 days before the date of departure of the train. This time-bound restriction regarding Aadhaar-linking is being implemented on the very first day. The aim of Railways is to curb fake IDs, bots and touts so that the chances of common passengers getting confirmed tickets can increase.
The rule is being implemented in three phases
Railways is implementing this new system in three phases.
First phase (effective from December 29):
Without linking Aadhaar, ticket booking through IRCTC account was stopped from 8 am to 12 noon.
Second phase (effective from January 5):
Now users without Aadhaar link will not be able to book tickets from 8 am to 4 pm.
Third phase (will be implemented from January 12):
Restrictions will become more strict in this phase. Without Aadhaar linked account, ticket booking will be completely stopped from 8 am to 12 midnight.
Which users will be affected
This rule will be applicable only to those IRCTC users who have not yet linked their account with Aadhaar. Aadhaar linked users will not face any problem in ticket booking.
purpose of railway
Railway officials say that this step has been taken to stop black marketing of tickets and to give priority to genuine passengers. Control over ticket booking during peak hours will also reduce the load on the system.
What should passengers do?
Railways has appealed to the passengers to link their IRCTC account with Aadhaar as soon as possible, so that any kind of problem can be avoided in future.
This rule is going to become completely strict in the coming days, in such a situation it will be in the interest of the passengers to link Aadhaar in time.