So say the officials. The year could also witness another ambitious plan of the Railways – air-conditioned local train service chugging on Mumbai's suburban system.
Will 2016 see Railways rolling out its commuter insurance plans?
So say the officials. The year could also witness another ambitious plan of the Railways – air-conditioned local train service chugging on Mumbai's suburban system.
As first reported by dna, the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) has prepared plans to provide long-distance train passengers a travel insurance with a one-time premium that has to be paid while buying one's ticket. Also, if everything goes as per plans, the long-pending air-conditioned local too will commence operation before the setting in of summer.
As per the IRCTC's initial plans, the insurance was envisaged for three types of incidents – accident, hospitalisation arising out of the accident and baggage loss. The time period of a journey itself has been divided into four parts, journeys of about 8 hours, those upto 24 hours, upto 36 hours and the ones above 36 hours.
The IRCTC had even distributed forms in trains to gauge commuter opinion in 2015. The IRCTC, in the opinion forms, had given a few examples of how much premium it would charge and had asked passengers to provide feedback on them. For example for an insurance of Rs2.05 lakh, which consists of Rs1 lakh each for accident and hospitalisation and Rs5,000 for baggage loss, the premium was set at Re1 for an 8-hour journey, Rs1.25 for a 24-hour journey, Rs1.50 for a 36-hour journey and Rs1.75 for a journey above 36 hours.
Similarly for an insurance of Rs4.25 lakh, where Rs2 lakh each is for accident and hospitalisation and Rs25,000 for baggage loss, the premium was set at Rs10 for an 8-hour journey, Rs11 for 24 hours, Rs12 for a 36-hour journey and Rs13 for travel above 36 hours.
The air-conditioned local plan, a Mumbai-specific one, was to check if the IRCTC – which is adept at tourism packages – could leverage its expertise to give commuters opting for AC trains something extra. This plan is independent of the AC services being planned by Western Railway with its first AC rake that is expected to come in by March this year.
When contacted, AK Manocha, chairman-managing director of IRCTC said both issues are being dealt by the railway ministry currently. "The insurance plans were forwarded to the ministry and hopefully something positive should come out of it. As far as the suburban air-conditioned trains are concerned, commercial issues with zonal railways (like Western and Central) have to be taken care of. Moreover, the zonal railways themselves plan to run such services so we have to check where we fit in," said Manocha.
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