Statistics available with the railways show that on WR, between January 1, when the service was rolled out, and March 27, only 30,768 season passes were sold on its suburban network
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s clarion call for a ‘cashless digital India’ isn’t invoking much of a response in Mumbai’s suburban railway network, if season pass sales using debit and credit cards is anything to go by. Sales using cards account for between 1-2.5 per cent of the total sales, and several ticketing clerks DNA spoke to said that the situation might not improve in the weeks to come if the railways does not bring in changes.
Statistics available with the railways show that on Western Railway (WR), between January 1, when the service was rolled out, and March 27, only 30,768 season passes were sold on its suburban network. Of these, 20,178 passes were bought using debit cards and 10,590 passes using credit cards. This is against the fact that every day, WR’s suburban network sees season pass sales of 30,000 units.
On Central Railway (CR), between January 1 and March 17, out of total season pass sales of 37,55,171 units, the share of season passes bought using debit or credit cards stood at 79,831 units, or about 2.1 per cent of the total. The period between March 1 and March 17 was slightly better, with total season pass sales of 10,24,105 units showing that the share of season passes bought using debit or credit cards stood at 25,706, or about 2.5 per cent of the total.
“This means that over a period of 80-odd days, the sale of season passes using credit and debit cards is just a little over what is sold at the ticket windows on WR in a single day. Surely, this is an issue that will have to be studied and rectifying measures will have to be taken,” said a senior railway official.
A ticketing clerk told DNA that the main issue was reluctance on the part of the public.
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 "Indian Railways")
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