Mumbai: Ticket checkers get hold of 2,993 ticketless passengers in single day

The arrest session of passengers travelling without tickets is going on at Central and Western Railway stations and ticketless passengers are struggling to evade the ticket inspectors. A checking drive has been undertaken at Dadar railway station of Central Railway and Virar-Dahanu railway station of Western Railway to prevent passengers from travelling free. In this campaign, 1,841 and 1,152 ticketless passengers have been arrested respectively. A fine of lakhs of rupees has been recovered from these passengers.

The number of ticketless passengers was increasing at overcrowded stations on the Western and Central Railways, affecting the revenue of the railways. Therefore, Central and Western Railways have taken up the 'Fortress Check' campaign for the past few days. Ticket checking campaign is being implemented by deploying RPF jawans for ticket checking at footbridges, station entrances, platforms in railway stations.

Due to the reduction in air-conditioned local ticket prices, the rush of passengers has increased. Taking advantage of this rush, ticketless or general local ticket holders are travelling in air-conditioned locales. Many times ticketless passengers are seen sitting in air-conditioned local trains and ticketed passengers travel standing. 

The same thing happens in first class, second class. As a result, ticket holders are inconvenienced. Therefore, the 'Fortress Check' campaign is being implemented by the Railways. 79 ticket inspectors and 19 RPF jawans were deployed at Dadar station of Central Railway on Monday. They caught 1,841 ticketless passengers. A fine of five lakh 59 thousand 800 rupees was recovered from these passengers. Each ticket checker caught about 23 ticketless passengers and earned the Central Railway about INR 7,000 in revenue.

1,152 ticketless passengers were nabbed by 330 ticket inspectors on the Virar-Dahanu section of the Western Railway on Monday. A fine of INR 3,20, 985 was recovered from them. Also, a senior official of Central and Western Railway informed that ticket sales are increasing due to frequent 'Fortress Check' campaigns.