Lost your Train Journey Ticket? Here’s what you should do

Indian Railways system is very supportive and public-friendly. It always focuses on its motto to provide a comfortable journey experience and will always be on the move to provide greater facilities to the passengers travelling via trains. There are many generous steps taken by IRCTC and the Railways ministry in favor of public welfare such as circular journey tickets, IRCTC e-catering, connecting PNR facility, e-ticketing and so on. Even there is provision of getting duplicate journey tickets if you lost your original one. There’re a set of rules and guidelines to abide by for regenerating a duplicate ticket and continue the journey without any hindrance.

There are almost 14,000 trains operated by Indian Railways system and it counts almost 30 million passengers travelling via trains on an average of everyday ridership. Losing/Misplacing the paper ticket could be very normal phenomena either due to heavy crowd at the railway station. One can also forget them at home during the preparations of the journey. So, instead of feeling like a panic-stricken patient, you can focus on the solutions that Indian Railways has introduced to the passengers for their ease. You can also check the train running status of your train, if the boarding station is different from the main source destination.

What to do first if the train ticket is lost?
As soon as you feel the absence of tickets, head towards the nearby PRS counter/ computerized reservation window at your nearest railway station and report about your lost ticket. You will be granted with a new ticket after paying the fixed amount. There are some rules and conditions of getting new tickets which is related to the payment of fee and status of the tickets (i.e. Confirmed/RAC/waiting). The status of the tickets determines whether you will be granted with a new ticket or not and also the set of rules differs before and after of the final journey chart preparation.

The passengers who have lost their journey tickets will have to abide by these set of rules in order to get a new ticket for their scheduled journey.

• First and foremost thing, you will be granted money as a refund for your lost, torn or misplaced train ticket.
• If you have a confirmed PRS ticket lost, then you can approach to the reservation counter at your nearest railway station or Chief Reservation Supervisor. You need to bring your original identity proof along with you for issuing a new ticket.
• Probably the passenger is asked to write an application saying for issuance of a new train ticket. The application contains the date of journey, source and destination details (boarding station and destination station), name of the concerned train and the train number. The passenger is asked to pay INR. 50/per ticket for second class and sleeper class confirmed ticket. On other classes of tickets such as AC –I, II, III, chair cars etc, the passenger need to pay INR 100/ ticket to get new tickets with PNR number. All of these processes and the payment are done before the final chart for the journey is prepared.
• After the final reservation chart is prepared, one need to pay the 50% amount of the ticket charges. Means, if the previous ticket cost was INR 300, the passenger has to pay INR 150 for the new ticket after the final chart preparation. The amount varies according to the class of travelling / reserved ticket previously.
• Once the final chart is prepared, there is no chance to get a new ticket for the RAC tickets. There is no provision yet launched in the Indian Railways to issue a duplicate ticket of RAC status after the final chart preparation.
• In case of the torn /distorted RAC ticket, after the preparation of final reservation chart, the duplicate ticket will be issued only after the payment of the 25% of the ticket charges. However for the lost RAC tickets, no further duplicate tickets will be issued.
• If a party coach / special train tickets are lost then the issuance of a new train ticket will be made on the payment of 10% amount of the previously reserved ticket. The issuance of new ticket for such train tickets can be made before/up to the departure of that particular train.

Issue of new ticket in case of E-Ticketing
If you have reserved your tickets using IRCTC online ticket booking portal, you will receive the confirmation of your reservation on your provided mail address and on your registered mobile number. You can also download the PDF of your reserved tickets on your mail and can take out the print out of it. This e-paper ticket functions as the normal ticket during your train journey.

If you have lost all the proof of your e-ticket reservation such as mail, SMS, PDF etc then you can still download your reserved tickets by logging into your IRCTC portal and get them again. You simply need to visit irctc.co.in and check the booking history. You will find out your latest and old tickets.

Refund rules related to the lost/distorted railway tickets
One needs to keep in mind that there’s no provision of refund if the train ticket is distorted or lost. However, the passenger can cancel their journey before the final reservation chart is prepared. The amount will be returned to the passengers after deducting the fixed amount as cancellation charges and other charges related to the time limit of cancellation. In some circumstances the refund policy is applicable by IRCTC refund rules these are written as such

• Refund of fare shall be granted to the passengers in case of torn /mutilated ticket if its genuineness and authenticity is verifiable on the basis of those particulars visible on the face of tickets.
• By good luck, if the passenger gets back their misplaced/lost journey ticket then they can approach to the ticket counter with duplicate and original tickets. The duplicate ticket is taken back and the applicable amount is refunded to the passengers after deducting the minimum amount rs 20 or 5% of the duplicate ticket charges.

The Indian Railway is in the race to provide facilities and nice travel experience to the passengers. Tickets reservation system, connecting PNR, Circular journey tickets, concessions and reservation for different kinds of people are some of the appreciable steps of the Indian Railways. Enjoy your railway journey by ordering food in train and make your train journey tastoholic. Keep journeying the Indian terrains and experiencing the fast moving Indian trains and their facilities provided to the passengers to give them a new and comfortable experience of train journey.