Hard times ahead for ticketless travellers in trains! The Khurda Road Division of the East Coast Railway has taken special ticket checking drives by deploying special squads to identify and penalise people travelling without tickets or with improper tickets. Failure to pay the penalty may even result in prosecution.
Till August of the current financial year, the checking squads have booked more than 61,000 passengers for travelling without tickets or with improper tickets which is 9,000 more than the figure of the corresponding period of last year.
Similarly, the squads have realised a sum of `2.64 crore from the ticketless travellers during the period which is `48.89 lakh more than the last year’s corresponding period.
The ticket-checking staffs have, however, been instructed against rude behaviour and asked to treat senior citizens and the elderly with respect.