The new facility will be one of the several passenger-friendly features planned to be rolled out before the Dussehra festival this year.
The Indian railways are mulling over the sale of e-tickets on its portal which will end the IRCTC's monopoly in the e-ticketing business and provide multiple booking avenues to rail passengers.
Highly placed sources in the railway ministry said that the new facility will be one of the several passenger-friendly features planned to be rolled out before the Dussehra festival this year that falls towards September end.
The decision, if materialises, could be yet another setback for the IRCTC, thanks to the new catering policy unveiled recently which stripped the railway public sector undertaking of its catering responsibility that formed its core business.
While the IRCTC made a business of approximately Rs450 crore from catering during the last financial year, it earned Rs 122 crore from selling e-tickets.
Currently, 30 per cent of all rail bookings are done through the IRCTC website.
CRIS, the IT arm of the railways, is understood to be already working on providing e-ticketing facility on the Indian railways website www.indianrailways.gov.in
Sources said passengers would stand to gain from such a move as getting access to the IRCTC website was proving difficult especially during the initial hours of the mornings when booking commences.
The railways had recently banned the IRCTC web-based agents from accessing tatkal bookings after complaints that they were cornering the berths to sell them at a premium.
Sources said that apart from providing the e-ticketing facility, the website will provide information about booking positions in waiting rooms, journey planners and others. The website itself will sport a new look before the Dussehra festival.
The IRCTC, on its part, has decided to roll out several other tourism packages keeping the upcoming festival season in mind and to leverage on its position in the rapidly growing tourism industry.
This apart, it would embark on plans to expand the packaged drinking water business. During the last financial year, it earned approximately Rs50 crore from the 'rail neer' business.
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