Mr. Meet Shah Vs Union of India, Ministry of Railway (Competition Commissioner of India)
Railway and IRCTC (Opposite Parties) have not been able to convince the Commission as to why the policy of rounding off of actual base fares to the next higher multiple of Rs.5 is applicable to the sale of online tickets, when it may be possible for the Opposite Parties to transfer even one paisa electronically. Further, during the preliminary conference, the Opposite Parties could not explain why rounding off is done separately for each passenger even when more than one tickets are booked through one account of the same time for a journey.
At this juncture, it appears that the Opposite Parties are rounding off the actual base fares for the online bookings without any plausible justification for the same. In view of the foregoing, the Commission is of the view that the practice of rounding off actual base fares to the next higher multiple of Rs. 5 by the Opposite Parties, prima-facie amount to an imposition of unfair condition in the market for sale of rail tickets in India, particularly for online booking of rail tickets, in contravention of provisions of Section 4 (2)(a)(i) of the Act.
