New Delhi | Jagran Business Desk: Indian Railways has announced that passengers in 200 railway stations across India will soon be able to recharge their mobiles, pay electricity bills, fill up Aadhaar and Pan card forms and even file taxes with help from Common Service Centre (CSC) kiosks to be set up by RailTel- an ICT provider and one of the largest neutral telecom infrastructure providers in the country.
This is being done in partnership with ‘CSC e-Governance Services India Limited' (CSC-SPV) and the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology.
The kiosks- Common Service Centres will be run by village level entrepreneurs (VLEs). It will offer services such as booking of the travelling tickets (train, air, bus etc.), Aadhar Card, Voter Card, Mobile recharge, Electricity bill payment, Pan card, Income tax, Banking, insurance and many more.
The system has been named ‘RailWire Saathi Kiosks'. It has been made operational in the Varanasi City and Prayagraj City stations in Uttar Pradesh on a pilot basis. Similar kiosks will be established at around 200 railway stations across India, mostly in rural areas, in a phased manner.
"Of these, 44 are in South Central Railway zone, 20 are in North Frontier Railway, 13 are in East Central Railway, 15 are in Western Railway, 25 are in Northern Railway, 12 are in West Central Railway, 13 are in East Coast Railway and 56 are in North Eastern Railway," news agency PTI reported.
Through this initiative, people in rural areas will be able to take advantage of various digital services provided by the government which they were unable to use due to lack of infrastructure and knowledge about the internet, said RailTel CMD Puneet Chawla.
RailTel has also created one of the largest integrated wi-fi networks of the world by providing public wi-fi at 6,090 stations; 5,000 of these are in rural areas. Now, the unit plans to deliver broadband services to these areas.
(With inputs from PTI)