India’s Central Railway section is raking in the bucks from rising illegal travel. It registered record earnings of 130.44 crore from ticketless/irregular travelers during April 2017 to January 2018 in its intensive drive against ticketless and irregular travel.

 January 2018 witnessed total 2.16 lakh cases of ticketless/irregular travel, while cases of unbooked luggage highlighted an increase of 11.32%, as against 1.94 lakh cases in January 2017. Revenue from ticketless/irregular travel was Rs 9.35 crore during January 2018 – a growth of 11.53%, as against Rs 8.38 crore in January 2017.

 The Central Railway detected total 26.57 lakh cases of ticketless/irregular travel and unbooked luggage during April 2017 to January 2018 — an increase of 17.38% — as against 22.63 lakh cases detected during the same period last year. The earnings in this period  from ticketless/irregular travel was Rs 130.44 crore, — an increase of 19.77% — as against Rs 108.91 crore in the same period last year. Additionally, Rs 2.97 lakh was recovered as penalty in cases of transfers of reserved journey tickets during January 2018, Central Railway sources said.

 Meanwhile, senior officials are also closely monitoring the revenue loss due to ticketless travel and other irregularities, even as the Central Railway endeavours to provide better services to bonafide rail users alongside curbing ticketless travel, the sources added.