Indian Railway Break Journey Tickets | Can they be Booked Online?

What are Indian Railway's break journey tickets? What are they? When they are used? Their benefits, rules, and more importantly how one can do booking of break journey tickets online on IRCTC.

Break Journey Tickets in Indian Railway

Indian Railway break journey tickets allows an individual to take a break at an intermediate station while traveling between two stations and than continue the train journey to final destination (after break) without needing to purchase a new ticket.

Use of Break Journey Tickets

Break journey tickets are used when you don't want to complete your entire journey in one go. You must be wondering why would someone discontinue the journey? There are several situations when you may want to complete your journey in parts. 

Some examples:

• Suppose you want to go from New Delhi to Kanyakumari in India. Also suppose 😃 you have a son 👦 who is studying in Kota (preparing for IIT exam). You decide you will halt for couple of days at kota to spend some time with him. What will you do? Book two tickets - One from New Delhi to Kota and other from Kota to Kanyakumari? No, you can book only 1 ticket, break your journey at Kota, and continue to final destination at later date.
• Similarly, suppose you are travelling from Jodhpur to Howrah. Agra comes in between. It's pretty luring and almost forcing you to visit Taj Mahal. Again, you can take a break at Agra station, visit Taj Mahal and other tourist places, and than board the train to Howrah at later date.

Benefits of Booking Break Journey Train Tickets

1. Less Total Fare: Do you know in Indian Railway the longer distance you travel, lesser is the rate at which train fare increases? You can take advantage of this rule by using break journey railway tickets. For example, if you travel 1000 kms in AC 3 class,  in one go(with break in between), train fare will be around Rs 1008. On the other hand if you book two tickets, one for journey of 700 kms and other for remaining 300 kms your fare will be calculated as (795+410= 1205 INR) . Rates applied on break journey tickets are called 'telescopic fare rates' of railway, and they are much less, making journey cheaper.
2. Lesser Reservation Charges : Since you are booking one ticket for entire journey you save money which you would be paying had you booked different train tickets for different legs of your journey. Remember, each time you book train tickets you need to pay railway booking charges, reservation charges, mail/superfast charges. If booking is done online you need to pay irctc booking charges too.
3. Easy to Track Reservation Status: While you will complete your journey in parts, stopping on the way, your ticket PNR(Passenger Name Record) number remains same in case of break journey tickets. Using the same PNR you can claim refunds, check status etc. Much easier to track one PNR status than two. Isn't it?
4. Convenience: You can travel in different trains and also class of travel doesn't need to be same. Thus you can travel in faster train (superfast) in AC class to cover longer part of journey quickly and than take a passenger train for small portion remaining in 2nd sitting class and save money again.

Break Journey Ticket Rules

There are certain railway rules and regulations which are followed before issuing break journey/ thorough onward journey tickets to an individual:

1. Distance Requirement: Break in journey is allowed only after minimum travel of 500 kms. In no case break can be allowed before a passenger has traveled 500 kms.
2. Number of Breaks: Only 1 break is allowed if total journey distance is more than 500 kms and less than 1000 kms.  Above 1000 km distance, 2 breaks are allowed. Maximum of only 2 breaks are allowed.
3. Breaking Period/Time: As per railway board, break period cannot be less than 24 hrs (i.e. your connecting train shouldn't depart before 24 hours) and the period of break-journey that can be availed at a station will be upto a maximum of 2 days only (excluding the day of arrival and the day of departure of the train). For all return tickets, each half of the tickets is treated as a single journey ticket.
4. Train Types: Break journey tickets are not issued for trains like Rajdhani Express, Shatabadi Express, Tejas express, Duronto etc. which have separate all inclusive fare structure on point-to-point basis, and therefore, refund on such partially used tickets is also not admissible.
5. Train Ticket Treatment: Passenger are required to endorse their ticket at a station where journey is broken. To endorse ticket, go to station master and ask him to put station code, date, and his initials. This is extremely important otherwise you be treated as travelling without ticket when you resume your journey and would be dealt accordingly.
6. Refund in case of discontinuation of Journey: If after taking break, individual decides not to take rest of the journey than he can submit his ticket at the counter, deposit ticket and get a (TDR) ticket depository receipt and follow the instructions. The refund will be granted as per railway refund rules.
7. Intimation: The requirement regarding break of journey must be told to railway before commencing journey at the time of filling up reservation form.

Booking Break Journey Tickets Online IRCTC

Friends, the Indian Railway break journey tickets cannot be booked online. They can be purchased only from railway reservation counters. Disappointed? 😞

Well, Cheer up! IRCTC (Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation) offers much better option known as connecting train ticket (more halting period, online booking facility, full refund).

Happy 🙋?

Booking thorough train tickets at counter is quite easy:

Step 1. Ask for railway reservation form from booking clerk. You need a normal form like shown below.

Step 2: In the portion highlighted in green on form above, you will fill the details of the main journey. 

• Here fill the train number/ name, class, date of journey, boarding station normally.
• Station from: fill the station from where you start the journey.
• To: In this field end the last station of entire journey (your final destination).
• Reservation upto: In this filed enter the station where you want to take a break.

Your reservation in first train will be done till the station mentioned in "reservation upto" column.

Step 3: Now see the orange part in the form where you will fill the details of next part of journey. The "Onward/ Return Journey Details". Here fill the details of second train. Make sure that "from station" field is same as the "reservation upto" field for the first train.

Step 4: Complete other details like address, mobile number, and submit it at the counter.

Step 5. Tell the clerk at counter you want to book telescopic train ticket . Unfortunately many railway staff these days don't know railway rules. If he doesn't understand tell him that you want to take break in journey and ticket must be booked for entire journey.

That's it! You should be able to get a break journey ticket.