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Indian railways offer several wonderful facilities to the passengers. Some of the most common benefits received by the travellers are; PNR enquiry, internet reservation, train/fare accommodation, trains between important stations, passenger chart and seat availability. The reservation system of Indian railways is also known as Passenger Reservation System or PRS. The vast network of reservation offices and terminals spread across all the corners of the country enable passengers to books their seats. The main purpose of this system is to facilitate long queues of passengers so that they can have hassle free journey.
Indian railway reservation system is divided into five reservations hubs of New Delhi, Chennai, Mumbai, Kolkata and Secunderabad. This integrated system is immensely beneficial for passengers in getting reservation from anywhere to anywhere in any train. This was not the case during earlier times when passengers had to go through lot of hardship to get reservation. A railways journey can be fun, pleasure or pain depending upon the ticket status. If one has got a confirmed seat then even a long journey like Kashmir to Kanyakumari from Himsagar express can be fun else, things are not going to be very smooth. So to ensure that, passengers are aware of their reservation status, railway provides option of knowing seat availability from one particular destination to another.
Determining the reservation status and seat availability of the ticket is very easy. One can get the information from all the ticket counters or check out on his own by using official sites of Indian railway. The ticket status is also indicated on the printed ticket. In case, ticket is confirmed one will get coach and berth number mentioned on the ticket else the waiting status. Seat availability is subject to time, distance and route. One can get advanced reservation 90 days prior to the journey yet some of the routes are so busy that it’s hard to get a confirmed seat even though you are prepared beforehand.
Many a time, passengers prefer to book their tickets despite the waiting status, assuming that by the time journey date arrives, ticket will get confirmed. Every train has a certain number of seats in different classes of sleeper, AC three tier, AC two tier or first class. Some seats are reserved for Tatkal system where people can book tickets two days prior to the journey date. When one books a train ticket, he is likely to get one among the four options of, confirmed seat, RAC, waiting or no room. The last one indicates, there is not even any room for any waiting passenger to stand whereas RAC (Reservation Against Cancellation) refers to the option where one will be offered a sitting accommodation and later on a berth is allotted if any passenger does not turn up for travel.
Indian railway regularly updates the seat availability in each and every long distance train. Seat availability is essentially relevant to reservation system. One can check all the information related to reservation including seat availability at the official site of Indian railways, www.indianrail.gov.in and www.irctc.co.in.
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