Indian Railways to offer rail tickets via recharge vendors

April 22, 2008 at 8:51 am Leave a comment

Indian Railways has taken the first step towards offering mobile ticketing – LiveMint reports it plans to use the countrywide network of mobile recharge vendors as a key distribution channel. Plans are afoot to also allow users to book tickets from their own mobile phones.

When you go to a recharge shop for a top-up, all you need to do is to ask the vendor to also accept separate payment for the railway ticket. The money deposited for the ticket will be transferred to the service provider through a mobile phone transaction into a designated account. The service provider, in turn, will transfer the money to the railways,” said a senior railway officer.

The railways will then issue a unique PIN number over the mobile phone that the passenger will need to key in onto a designated kiosk installed at the railway station to print the actual ticket.