Railways migrate to 5 digit number scheme to monitor trains

Indian Railways today "smoothly" migrated to a five digit number scheme to monitor movement of passenger trains more effectively and facilitate management of train information scientifically for public convenience.

"The migration went of smoothly as the date upgradation was carried out in the systems overnight to cause least inconvenience to passengers," said a railway ministry official.

The pan-India 139 rail enquiry system has also added a new number '7' in the system to enable passengers find the new train numbers.

The migration to five digit number had also become necessary as the four digit numbering scheme had got exhausted with the Indian Railways running more than 10,000 trains every day, the official said.

To make the transition smooth and simple, only a prefix of the digit 1 (one) has been added to the four-digit numbers of the existing trains.

They include all scheduled and regular express or mail and superfast trains including the Durontos, Yuva Trains, Rajdhani, Shatabdi, Jan Shatabdi, Garibrath and Sampark Kranti Express trains.

For example, under the new scheme, the number of Kolkata Rajdhani from now on would be 12302 and 12952 for Mumbai Rajdhani.

"The new system will also make the numbering of trains of railways more scientific, logical, uniform and computer-friendly besides integrating passenger and suburban train services in various information systems," the official said.

The Railways said the initiative will create a unique train number which will be a national level identity for each train and will cover all the passenger-carrying trains running in the Indian Railways network.

IRCTC, the official agency of Indian Railways for issuing e-tickets and i-tickets through its website www.irctc.co.in, said it "has already begun printing the five digit train numbers on its E Tickets and I Tickets for any date of journey, after 20 December 2010."

The special trains run by the Railways during holiday and festival season will also be numbered on the pattern of the mail and express trains except that they shall have the prefix of digit '0' (zero).

This shall apply to all special trains, whether superfast, express or passenger train in character, running between any pair of destinations, the Railway statement added.