Claim:
A post (here, here & here) is widely circulating on social media, claiming that Indian Railways has announced a new policy offering a 50% concession on train ticket fares for senior citizens. Let’s verify the accuracy of this claim.
Archived post can be seen here.
Investigation:
According to the Ministry of Railways (archive), as part of measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19, the central government withdrew several concessions in March 2020, including the senior citizen concession in trains. Before this, the Railways provided a 50% discount on ticket fares for women above 58 years of age and a 40% discount for men above 60 on all mail and express trains. However, the Railways has not officially announced the restoration of this concession. The IRCTC portal also shows that ticket prices for senior citizens remain the same as those for general-category passengers.
Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has repeatedly clarified (here, here & here) in the Parliament that there are no plans to reintroduce concessions for senior citizens, a stance reiterated in 2022. He emphasized that the Government of India already subsidizes approximately 50% of travel costs due to low ticket prices while still providing concessions for persons with disabilities, patients, and students. In March 2022, he stated that extending these concessions to senior citizens is not feasible given the significant financial strain caused by the decline in total passenger revenue after the pandemic. In April 2023, when the issue of reintroducing senior citizen concessions was brought before the Supreme Court, the court declined to intervene, stating that the decision should be based on the needs of senior citizens and the financial viability of the Railways.
Moreover, in December 2024, when the same issue was raised in the Lok Sabha, Vaishnaw responded that the total subsidy provided by the Government of India for all categories (including senior citizens) of the passengers currently amounts to ₹56,993 crore. Additionally, the Union Budget 2025-26 does not mention any plan to reinstate concessions on train fares for senior citizens.
To sum up, the claim that the Indian government has restored concessions on train fares for senior citizens is false.
Conclusion: The claim is false. Indian Railways discontinued senior citizen concessions in March 2020 as part of COVID-19 measures. The government has repeatedly clarified that there are no plans to reinstate these concessions due to financial constraints. The IRCTC portal also shows that senior citizens are charged the same fare as general passengers. Additionally, there was no mention of restoring these concessions in the Union Budget 2025-26. Hence the claim made in the post is false.
(The fact-check story was originally published by Factly and has been republished by Lighthouse Journalism as a part of Shakti Collective.)
