Ultimately I think train travel in India is part of the culture and thus should be part of your experience when coming to India. If only to master the art of peeing on a moving train or sharing a meal with a local family you just met.

As a foreigner you currently have 2 options to buy your train ticket online: via 12go or on the website of the IRCTC (Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation Ltd.). I tried both and they each have their advantages and disadvantages, I will walk you through the process.


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Once you have found the train you want you select the class and afterward you can book your ticket if the class you want is still available for your travel date. These tickets will show AVL for available. During the next step, you will put in your details including your passport number, and choose the seat/bunk you would like. Then you are ready to pay for your ticket and yes, you can just use your international credit card.

One of the most common questions: do I have a seat reservation when I get a ticket for a train in India? This question usually comes from a German as we are used to paying almost 5 Euro extra if we want a seat reservation.

If you book your ticket with 12go you will get your seat assigned. If you book your ticket through IRCTC you can choose where you want to sit. I like this option better because especially for the sleeper train I had specific ideas about where I wanted to sleep for safety and privacy reasons.

Download the Ixigo App and put in your PNR to check the status of your train (great to confirm whether it is on time or not) and to see the order of the coaches. Click on your coach in the app and you can see the seat figuration and find your seat.

This chart is useful as you will already get an idea of where approximately your coach will be once the train arrives at the platform. On the platform you will see displays switching from the train number to the coach number all along. This way you will know where your coach will be when the train arrives and you can wait there.

There is also a quota for women compartments, people with disabilities, and the infamous taktal. This can be helpful if you are super late with booking your tickets as this quota is only released a day before the departure of the train. However, these tickets also cost more, and sometimes the price is even increased based on demand.

You will see the price differences in the various classes with first class being the most expensive one, often costing double. But generally train travel in India is super cheap, especially when compared to trains in Germany (thanks, Deutsche Bahn).

You will also get a sheet and a pillow even for your day trip if you like. I was told that sheets on Indian trains all get boiled and are thus quite clean and they are being handed out in a fresh paper package.

CC stands for chair class the one that probably reminded me most of German regional trains. You will usually have 3+2 chairs per row and the seat in front of you has a little tray table. There are some rows where chairs face each other and you have a bigger table in the middle. And the seats will even recline a bit!

The first time I came to India to see the Golden Triangle I was too scared to take the train. Instead, I asked my friend to organize a private driver for me, something that was still super affordable. Then came my trip with the Maharajas Express, obviously a very different kind of train experience than your average journey. But to be honest, it got me excited about train travel in India.

Luckily, I had no issues whatsoever and everyone was really kind. From the driver who walked me to the platform to the young boy and his grandmother who wanted to share their food with me, people were nothing but helpful and lovely when traveling by train in India.

Are you on your period? To be honest, I would avoid a trip long enough that you will need to empty your cup or change your tampon. While most train toilets have a small sink, it is really not the place you want to deal with this.

Honestly, I was impressed with how punctual the majority of my trains were. One was delayed by a total of 2 hours after the area was hit by heavy rains and flooding so that seemed like a good enough reason.

To make sure you know if your train is either departing or arriving late you can check the Ixigo App which is not 100% reliable but pretty good. In general, it seems similar to flights: the earlier you depart the better your chances are for no delays building up over the course of the day.

In some cities auto and taxi drivers can get quite annoying once you exit the train station. In fact, in Jaipur, a driver started hassling me while I was still on the platform and approached me five times until I almost put my hand in his face to tell him off. If your accommodation provides this service ask them to organize a driver for you. Otherwise, check with them beforehand how much you should pay for an auto from the train station. Ultimately you will have to say yes to one of them and this way you will at least know a reasonable price.

The greatest invention and option to eat on a train in India is to pre-order your meal. There are a few apps and websites for this but I recommend the IRCTC Catering App. All you need to do is put in your PNR and the app will show you the route you are traveling and stops along the way where you can order food. Each stop usually has a few restaurant options. Pick a restaurant and order the food you would like. Depending on the restaurant you will either pay cash on delivery or can pre-pay with your credit card. Then you just need to get on your train, sit back, and wait for the magic to unfold.

And honestly, it is pure magic to me how it all works out. Get a local SIM card so the delivery guy can contact you if needed. The restaurant has your seat number through your PNR so they bring the food straight to your place. Once you arrive at the station you ordered from someone will hop on the train and bring you your meal. If you still have to pay make sure to have small change.

I am updating this post as of July 3rd, 2020, to say that there is a NEW, even better way to book trains in India (thank god, finally!). It is 12go.asia and myself, my friends, and members of the Facebook group have been using it with great success for both trains and buses. I have trialed them for nearly 6 months now before introducing them to make sure it works okay.

Classes that 12go.asia sells are 1AC, 2AC, 3AC, SL, and EC/CC. To learn more about what these classes mean, check out my blog posts on train classes. I recommend 2AC, 1AC, and 3AC in that order (beds, blankets, pillows, A/C). SL is a basic sleeper class and EC/CC are air conditioned chairs.

Hi Rachel! Thank you very much for this article, it really clearifies things. However, one small question; I am looking at train/bus tickets for next month and a lot seems to be not available anymore! Is this normal and should I have been earlier with booking beforehand, or will some options maybe appear online later? Would love hearing from you!

Hello, I want to travel India next year. I am so confused about transportation in India. I want to go Bombay to Jaipur. What is the cheapest way to transport? If I need to take a AC train how can I book tickets from USA? After Jaipur I want o go Agra and then Golden Temple. I need your advice about hotels and transportation.

Just after the recent terrible train crash near Balasore station in the eastern state of Odisha, in which more than 280 people died, posts started circulating on different social media platforms and WhatsApp groups, blaming Muslims for the accident.

Could it be a coincidence that it was a Friday when three trains collided with each other in Odisha? As if the Friday angle was not sufficient, a lie was invented that the station master was Muslim. To make it look more sinister, the photo of a religious shrine near the railway track where the accident had taken place was spread on social media claiming that it was a mosque, suggesting that there must be some link between the mosque and the accident.

Sadly, fact-checking only cements doubts created by fake news in minds that are already prejudiced against Muslims and are being told day and night that Muslims are conspiring against the nation. These are minds trained to think that there is a need to keep an eye on Muslims and to subjugate them using laws and, if necessary, violence.

Horrific accidents like the recent train crash invariably claim the lives of ordinary Muslims along with their Hindu compatriots. But an atmosphere of hate and division has been created that makes even collective grieving impossible. At a time when the nation is still asking how such an accident occurred when the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi claims to have revolutionised the railways, the response is unbridled Islamophobia.

Until a few years back, of the 35 000 cleft children born every year in India, only one-third received surgical correction; a mere half of these at the hands of a trained surgeon. A large majority of patients even today do not seek treatment and are resigned to their fate ascribing the condition to be a curse from God. This was compounded by the fact that treatment was lacking in rural areas and cities in some states of the country since government hospitals could not provide treatment for clefts. While treatment in private hospitals was too expensive for these patients, the few medical colleges proficient in cleft care failed to cope with an endless stream of patients. India, therefore, became a country with the unsavoury distinction of nursing the biggest backlog of unoperated cleft patients in the world.

The Smile train started functioning in India since the year 2000 with Mr. Satish Kalra as regional director (South Asia). The first few Smile Train centres were in southern India in Bangalore, Chennai and Thrissur. Soon many plastic surgeons came forward and expressed their willingness to work for this cause and became partners of the Smile Train [Figure 5]. By 2004, more than 30 centres started working in different parts of the country and this mission gathered momentum. Some of the centres in south, western and northern India were performing exceptionally well. They started organizing outreach programmes to reach out to these cleft patients in a very effective way. Patients had now developed faith in the Smile Train centres and they started coming to them in big numbers as the news spread by word of mouth. ff782bc1db

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