The people of the country will now be able to enjoy rail travel in AC class coaches at affordable rates. Indian Railways has fixed the fare of AC 3 Economy Class. To attract people to this service, the AC 3 Economy Class Fare has been kept less than AC3 coaches.
However, the government has not announced the fare for the AC3 economy class. As per a Zee News report citing sources, the fare will be about 8 per cent less than the fare of AC3 class due to which people travelling in sleeper class will be attracted towards this new class of coach.
According to the information, 50 coaches of AC3 Economy Class have been prepared in Kapurthala Rail Coach Factory of Punjab. These coaches have been sent to different railway zones across the country. Railways plans to prepare 800 such coaches this year. Of these, 300 coaches will be manufactured at Integral Coach Factory Chennai, 285 at Modern Coach Factory Rae Bareli and 177 at Rail Coach Factory Kapurthala.
Usually, there are 72 berths in AC3 and sleeper coaches, but 83 berths have been installed in AC3 economy class by adjusting the space. For this, the 2 berths available on the side have been converted into 3 berths. The advantage of this is that the number of berths in the AC3 economy class has increased by 15 per cent. By reducing its fare, the railway wants to return its benefit to the passengers.
As per the report, except for the AC3 coach, the railways have to bear losses of up to 20-25% every year in all the other coaches. Therefore, Railways wants to make it popular by gradually improving the AC3 coach and reducing the ticket prices so that people travelling in sleeper class can travel in AC3 economy class by spending a little more. The government also plans to gradually reduce the sleeper class coaches from the trains and increase it to AC3 economy class coaches.
