All-Women TC Crew To Be Posted On Mumbai-Ahmedabad Shatabdi Exp

In a recent experiment, the Western Railway deployed an all-women TTE (travelling ticket examiners) staff on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Shatabdi Express. Interestingly, it observed that its earnings registered a 66% jump in a single day.

Seeing the success of the experiment, it has been decided that the Shatabdi Express of Western Railway will have an all-women ticket checking crew from March 8, International Women's Day.

Currently, of the six TTEs on Shatabdi Express, only two are women. Usually, women TTEs are deployed on the platform. In Mumbai's WR division, there are a total of 96 TTEs, of which around 50 are in Mumbai.

A senior WR official said, "The trial with the all-women TTE squad was conducted on February 5-6. The results were extremely good as earnings on that day registered an increase of Rs 50,000 from the earlier Rs 30,000. We will now go in for a pilot project."

Also: Matunga: Mumbai’s First “All-Women” Railway Station Enters Limca Book

The idea is the brainchild of WR's senior divisional railway commissioner Aarti Singh Parihar. "Women are honest and the earnings on the day we held the trial run with all-women TTE staff proves it," he said.

Boost to women employment

Earnings are in the form of fines and penalty from unauthorised or ticketless travellers. Officials said some male staff are known to pocket money from fines instead of of issuing receipts to passengers.

Singh said, "I have begun to counsel women staff to take charge of the Rajdhani Express, too. However, there is some hesitation as the Mumbai-New Delhi Rajdhani Express is an overnight train. Hopefully, they will soon gain confidence."

Other initiatives

A few months ago, Central Railway's Matunga station was declared an all-women station. All its employees, including station manager, booking clerks, railway protection force (RPF), announcers etc are women. Such initiatives are a great way to rope in more women in the country's workforce.

Read Also: Jaipur’s Gandhi Nagar Is Country’s First ‘All-Women’ Railway Station

Also: Bengaluru: Namma Metro Gets its First Woman Executive Director

Picture credit: HT