New Delhi: Indian Railways is set to modernise its Passenger Reservation System (PRS) to process more than 1 lakh tickets per minute, up from the current capacity of 25,000 tickets per minute, according to a government statement. The upgrade is being carried out by the Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS).
The modernisation includes a complete replacement of the existing hardware, software, network systems, and security framework with newer technologies. The current PRS, introduced in 2010, runs on Itanium servers using an outdated Open VMS (Virtual Memory System) platform. Union Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw informed Parliament that the system will now move to cloud-compatible technology.
Indian Railways has observed a huge shift in passenger expectations over the years. The new PRS will focus on providing a smoother and faster experience, aligned with these evolving demands. The present PRS can book about 25,000 tickets per minute, and the new system is designed for more than 4 times this capacity. Effective from 1 November 2024, the Advance Reservation Period (ARP) for certain train services has been reduced from 120 days to 60 days, excluding the date of travel.
This change aims to reflect actual booking trends and to cut down on cancellations caused by unforeseen situations, the minister explained. To make ticket booking more accessible, Indian Railways recently launched the RailOne mobile app. The app allows users to book both reserved and unreserved tickets directly from their phones.
This move is expected to bring the reservation service closer to passengers and reduce dependency on ticket counters or desktop access. In another development, Indian Railways is increasing the availability of non-AC general and sleeper coaches.
Currently, around 70 per cent of coaches in Indian trains are non-AC, meeting the demand for affordable travel. A special manufacturing programme has been launched to produce 17,000 additional non-AC coaches over the next five years.
