India, June 6 -- The Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) has made it mandatory for users to link their Aadhaar numbers with their login IDs to book train tickets under the tatkal quota. The move, being implemented since this week, is aimed at preventing touts from booking multiple tatkal tickets and ensuring that genuine passengers get first priority in tatkal ticketing, said IRCTC officials.

Currently, the IRCTC platform has over 130 million active users, of which only 12 million accounts are Aadhaar-verified. Around 225,000 tatkal tickets are booked daily via the online platform, with 66.4% of tickets being sold within the first 10 minutes of the commencement of tatkal booking. Around 84.02% tatkal tickets are sold ...