Govt plans to serve local cuisine in Vande Bharat trains
New Delhi: Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw on Saturday discussed with officials on providing local cuisine of the region in Vande Bharat trains, and then roll it out across the railway network in the future.
Interacting with officials in a review meeting at Rail Bhawan here, the minister said that introducing local cuisine will significantly enhance the passenger experience by offering food that reflects the culture and tastes of the regions being traversed. This facility will be expanded to all the trains progressively in future.
The Minister also noted that the crackdown by Indian Railways on train ticket booking through fake identities is yielding positive results. Following the introduction of a stringent system to establish user identity and detect fake IDs, about 5,000 new user IDs are now being added daily on the IRCTC website.
Before the latest reforms, this number had touched nearly one lakh new user IDs per day. These steps have already helped Indian Railways deactivate 3.03 crore fake accounts.
Another 2.7 crore user IDs have either been temporarily suspended or identified for suspension based on the suspicious activities they are indulging in.
Vaishnaw, in the presence of the Minister of State Ravneet Singh Bittu, directed officials to ensure that the ticketing system is reformed to a level where all travellers can book tickets easily through a genuine user ID.
Earlier this week, the minister informed the Parliament that to curb misuse and improve fairness, Aadhaar-based OTP verification for online Tatkal ticket booking is now operational in 322 trains, and due to this, the confirmed Tatkal ticket availability time has increased by about 65 per cent in these trains.
Aadhaar-based OTP for Tatkal bookings at reservation counters has also been introduced in a phased manner, now implemented in 211 trains (as of December 4). As a result, the confirmed Tatkal ticket availability time has increased in about 95 per cent of the 96 popular trains, the minister stated.
Vaishnaw also informed that rigorous revalidation and verification of user accounts have been done.
“About 3.02 crore suspicious user IDs have been deactivated since January 2025. Anti-bot solutions such as AKAMAI are deployed to filter non-genuine users and ensure smooth booking for legitimate passengers,” he mentioned.