Now cancellation of railway tickets can be done by dialling 139. The sender will receive a onetime password (OTP). For claiming the refund amount the passenger has to reach the Passenger Reservation System (PRS) counter and reveal the OTP.

Besides this process, one can cancel the confirmed tickets through the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) website. Both the facilities have been made operational from Saturday.

Suresh Prabhu, Railway Minister, said: “This is an attempt to provide relief to passengers for cancellation of confirmed tickets.”

Both the initiatives were promised in the Railway Budget 2016-2017 and fulfilled today, Mr. Prabhu said.

According to the new refund rules, railways have doubled the cancellation charges with the aim of helping genuine passengers to get confirmation tickets.

Prabhu said: “Railways has an expansion programme in infrastructure for which fund is required. To carry out this task, increase in income is required. ”

Railways have to change the software accordingly for cancellation through IRCTC and 139.