Western Railway recovers Rs. 97.17 crore as fines during ticket checking drives

Mumbai Local Train. File Pic

The Western Railway (WR) collected record fine amounting to Rs. 97.17 crores during ticket checking drives conducted between April and September this year, the WR said in a statement on Monday.

According to the WR, in order to ensure hassle-free, comfortable travel and better services to all bonafide passengers, intensive ticket checking drives are being carried out constantly over Mumbai suburban local services, mail and express trains as well as holiday special trains to curb the ticketless passengers. The highly motivated ticket checking team under the supervision of senior commercial officers of WR organised several ticket checking drives during the period from April to September 2022, thereby recovering an amount of Rs. 97.17 crore as fines.

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According to a press release issued by Sumit Thakur, CPRO of WR, "during the month of September 2022, an amount of Rs. 9.99 crore was recovered through detection of 1.59 lakh ticketless and irregular passengers, including unbooked luggage cases. It is pertinent to mention that during the Financial Year 2022 - 23, total 14.39 lakh ticketless and irregular passengers and unbooked luggage cases were detected, as against 4.79 lakh cases detected during the corresponding period last, which is an increase of over 200%."

It said, fines of Rs. 97.17 crore was recovered from these passengers which is an increase of 295% over corresponding period of last year which was Rs. 24.60 crore.

To prevent unauthorised entry in AC local trains, frequent surprise ticket checking drives are carried out. As a result of these drives about 16000 unauthorized passengers have been penalized since April 2022. WR appeals to the general public to travel with proper and valid tickets, it added.