Now, you can soon check vacant seats, berth availability in train online

New Delhi, Jan 4: It's a good news for Indian Railways passengers. The commuters can now check vacant seats and berth availability online on trains in order to further ease ticket booking procedure.

According to a report by news agency PTI, Railways Minister Piyush Goyal has asked senior officials to make reservation chart public with the help of Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS).

When a passenger is booking a seat through airlines' website, it shows the seating layout or the seating diagram with the booked seats in a different colour so that he or she can see the number of seats that are still vacant and can be booked.

In the computerised Passenger Reservation System (PRS), confirmed berths or seats are allotted on the first come, first served basis till the availability and thereafter Reservation Against Cancellation (RAC) or Waiting List tickets are issued.
The status of RAC or Waiting List tickets gets automatically updated against the cancellation of confirmed berths or seats and also against release of unutilised reservation quotas.

This move will further improve ticket booking procedure and reduce the number of complaints of passengers regarding clarity in the availability of tickets.

Not only this, the food that you get on board a train is set to improve further in the coming days. The Indian Railways Catering and Tourism Corporation has been working to improve its food quality.