More than a million passengers have so far left Karachi via trains and buses for celebrating Eid-ul-Fitr with their loved ones at their hometowns. However, more people preferred to travel by trains, while 36000 have so far travelled by inter-city route buses after paying up to 50 to 90 percent higher than the usual fares to blackmarketeers of train and bus tickets.
Incharge Booking Office of Cantonment Station Ehtsham Ahmed told Business Recorder on Thursday that 16 to 20 trains were running towards other cities boarding over 25000 passengers daily during the holy month of Ramazan.
He said that around 8 to 10 lakh passengers travelled to various parts of the country last year and it was expected that the number of passengers would cross the figure of one million this year.
Special trains have also been started to run from Wednesday to facilitating thousands of peoples, he added. On the other hand, Railways Minister Shaikh Rasheed Ahmed has issued directives for providing 50 per cent discount to the travellers on the eve of Eid besides starting campaign to control illegal ticket selling with stern action.
While Eid-ul-Fitr is just one day ahead, unauthorised ticket sellers had purchased large number of tickets causing ticket shortage besides creating hindrances for the passengers, sources said.
These ticket hoarders have made huge investments to gain illegal profits as the same tickets are being sold on higher prices, they said and added that these hurdles were creating a positive impact on inter-city buses business.
They informed that three main groups including Railway police, parking contractors and Qulees, are involved in the selling of illegal railway tickets. Such groups have purchased tickets of over one million rupees which would give them a huge profit in return, they added.
They said that a ticket of lower AC class (Karachi to Lahore) costs Rs 1900 while the same ticket is being sold at Rs 3500. Inter-city bus transports have added more buses so as to save passengers from problems, which was faced by them last year due to overcrowding, Haji Talib Hussain, a reputable transporter told Business Recorder.
He said that around 30,000 passengers travelled to various parts of the country through Inter-city buses last year and it was expected that the number would be much higher this year due to overcharging on railways tickets.
A survey by Business Recorder revealed that people have thronged the bus terminals at Empress Market, Sohrab Goth, Taj Complex, Lee Market and Sharah-e-Laiquat to reserve their seats. Some minor clashes could also be seen between passengers and transporters at bus stands over slow procedure for reservation of bus seats taking sometimes more than hours.
On the other side, transporters were of opinion that they were not overcharging the passengers and following first come first out rule at thronged bus terminals. Moreover, Adil Siddiqui, Minister for Labour, Transport, Industries and Commerce has issued directives to end overcharging at Inter-city bus terminals and ordered to take stern action against those who were found guilty.
Passengers at different overcrowded bus stands said that despite experiencing all these malpractice they would rather prefer inter-city buses for travelling than train. When asked about reason to give priority to buses on trains, they replied that buses were fast carriers and had cheaper rates as compares to the trains.