How To Book A Tatkal Ticket Online Through IRCTC
IRCTC or Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation provides a special booking facility to enable users to book train tickets on a short notice. Tickets under the Indian Railways’ Tatkal programme can be booked by a registered IRCTC user by paying a premium over the normal fare a day ahead of the journey. The IRCTC Tatkal train ticket booking service opens at 10:00 am every day for making air-conditioned (AC) class and 11:00 am for non-AC class reservations, according to IRCTC’s website – irctc.co.in. IRCTC is the online ticketing arm of the Indian Railways. (Also Read: Tatkal ticket rules and other important details)
Here’s how to book train tickets under the Indian Railways’ Tatkal programme:
The user is required to log in to the IRCTC booking portal in order to book Tatkal tickets. Therefore, if not registered with the IRCTC portal already, the user is required to complete the registration process and log in using his or her account details.
After login, the user is directed to the “Book Your Ticket” page. Here, the user can search for available trains by filling in details such as source and destination stations, date of journey and class of travel.
The next page displays the list of trains available for the selected route. The user can access information about the timings and route of a train by clicking on its name.
In the next step, the user is required to indicate the booking class for the selected train.
The “quota” option is available at right side of the above train list. For booking a Tatkal ticket, the user needs to select “Tatkal” under the quota section.
To book a Tatkal ticket in the selected train, the user is required to click on the “Book Now” option.
On the passenger reservation page, the user is required to confirm details such as the train name, station names, class and journey date displayed on the left side of the page to proceed.
After this step, the user is asked to enter details such as the names, age, berth preference and food choice for each passenger.
After entering the details, the user may proceed by clicking on the “continue booking” option. At this stage, any of the filled details can be changed by selecting the “re-plan booking” option.
The ticket details, total fare (including taxes) and availability of berths at the particular time are displayed on the screen. After tallying the details, the user can proceed to make the payment against the booking by clicking on the “continue booking” option.
After successful payment and booking of accommodations, the ticket confirmation page is displayed. A virtual reservation message (VRM) in the form of SMS is sent by the Railways system to the mobile number provided in the passenger reservation form.