(a) whether the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) has introduced new
complaints forms in order to receive complaints regarding catering services in the trains;
(b) if so, the number of complaints received with regard to the catering services so far,
after introduction of new complaint forms;
(c) the improvements made in the catering services in view of these complaints; and
(d) the action taken by the Railways to ensure high standards of catering in future ?
MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF RAILWAYS (SHRI R. VELU)
(a) : No, Sir.
(b) and (c) : Do not arise.
(d) : As an ongoing process, catering services of Indian Railways receive constant attention
of the Zonal Railways and Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), a wholly
owned company of Indian Railways formed to upgrade and professionalize the catering and
hospitality services of Indian Railways. IRCTC is setting up multi-cuisine state-of-the-art
Food Plazas, Automatic Vending Machines to dispense hot and cold beverages, and modernizing
railways’ existing base kitchens. Regular monitoring of catering services is done by Railways
and IRCTC officials. IRCTC has engaged independent food audit agencies to ensure quality of
food being supplied to the passengers of Indian Railways. All good practices like, progressive
ISO (International Organization for Standardization) and HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical
Control Points) certification of catering units are being followed. As per normal practice,
complaints received from passengers are monitored by IRCTC and action like, termination of
contract, imposition of fine, warning, etc. are taken on cases found substantiated. IRCTC has
set up control rooms at New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai and Secunderabad for receipt and
redressal of complaints. Each of these control rooms has personal computers with broadband
connectivity and dedicated telephone lines. Any passenger can make a telephone call to any
of these control rooms and immediate action is taken on these complaints/suggestions.
In addition to above steps like, Customer Satisfaction Survey conducted through M/s
IMRB International, Food Audit done by M/s TUV Sud South Asia on 112 units including Trains,
Base Kitchens & Food Plazas, engagement of M/s RITES for ISO 22000:2005 certification of
mobile as well as static units, conducting special drives on premium trains including
Rajdhani, Shatabdi and other Mail/Express trains through Quality Control Professionals (QCPs)
so as to improve quality of catering services, introduction of Colored Menu Cards depicting
a-la-Carte items along with their rates etc. have been taken to effect improvement in catering
services.