Railways add facilities for sleeper class passengers: minister

Minister of State for Railways Kotla Jaya Surya Prakash Reddy today said that the railways added facilities like snack tables, bottle holders, magazine bags and mobile/laptop charging socket etc. for passengers travelling in the general sleeper class and non-air conditioned sleeper class coaches. These coaches are also being covered under various coach housekeeping schemes viz., frequent cleaning of coaches on run on select trains under On Board Housekeeping scheme, enroute cleaning of coaches at nominated stations under Clean Train Station Scheme, Reddy said in written reply to a question in Rajya Sabha.[caption id=“attachment_645351” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] A young boy travelling in a sleeper coach of the Indian Railways. Reuters[/caption] The number of passengers of sleeper class during the year 2011-12 was 332.16 million and the revenue accrued from them as fare was Rs 7261.5 crore, the minister said. The number of passengers of other classes is 7892.23 million and the revenue earned from other classes as fare was Rs 20984.84 (both suburban and non suburban classes), Reddy said. A total number of 382 second class sleeper coaches have been planned to be manufactured in Production Units of Indian Railways during current year in 2012-13.