Proposals
to open Passenger Reservation System (PRS) counters in about 50 post offices
across the State is awaiting the nod from Southern Railway for nearly two years
now.
The
Postal Department began offering services to book railway tickets in post offices
back in 2013. As of now, there are 34 such PRS counters in post offices across
the State. Of this, eight are in the Chennai city region, including the post
offices at IIT Madras, Shastri Bhavan.
Officials
said the department tied with the Southern Railway to take the service to
customers living in areas which do not have easy access to such facilities.
However, proposals sent to the Southern Railway, during the course of past two
years, are still pending.
Some
of the significant proposals to open PRS counters are in Anna Road head post
office, Chennai and Tiruchi Airport post office. “We identify places which are
far away from the railway stations or other PRS booking centres,” said J.T.
Venkateswarulu, Postmaster General (Mails and Business Development).
Nearly
1.35 lakh transactions, including cancellation of tickets, were carried out in
the past six months. The Postal Department earned a revenue of nearly Rs. 21
lakh through the PRS counters during this period.
More
counters would help customers, particularly in rural and semi urban areas who
still prefer to book tickets through PRS counters, officials said.
Southern
Railway officials said that, at present, PRS centres were functioning in 30
locations across Tamil Nadu. Some proposals for setting up PRS counters in post
offices were pending as they were awaiting equipment. However, sources also
said they were not keen on opening such PRS counters in more post offices,
immediately, as it did not fetch much revenue to the Southern Railway, especially
in urban areas.
With
the increase of online booking through IRCTC, authorised agents and mobile
applications, there were also queries from within the Railway administration
about the need to open such booking counters, especially in spaces where revenue
is not bound to be on the high side, sources said.
Anna
Road Head Post Office, the Chennai and Tiruchi Airport Post Offices are among
the ones proposed.
Source
: http://www.thehindu.com
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