India · Fares
What each passenger in your party actually pays — and why a 75% concession is never 75% off the ticket.
Most concessions need at least 300 km, though the categories that still exist are largely exempt from that.
2 passengers · Sleeper (SL)
₹630
₹180 less than ₹810 at full fare — 22% off the party's ticket.
The reference fare everything else is measured against.
₹405
Half the basic fare, and the child shares your berth. Other charges are levied in full.
₹225
50% off the basic fare
Full basic fare is ₹353; the concession applies to this component only.
Charged in full.
Charged in full.
Declared at booking as "no separate berth". Age is reckoned on the date of the journey.
Roughly fifty concession categories were suspended on 20 March 2020. Divyangjan, the listed patients and students came back. These did not, and no proposal to restore them has been accepted since — which is why they are listed here rather than left out for someone to keep searching for.
| Category | What it used to be |
|---|---|
| Senior citizens | 40% for men aged 60+, 50% for women aged 58+ |
| Accredited journalists | 30% in most classes |
| National award teachers | 50% in Second and Sleeper |
| Sportspersons | 50–75% depending on the level of competition |
| Unemployed youth travelling to interviews | 50% in Second Sitting |
| Allopathic doctors | 10% in all classes |
Concession applies to the basic fare only
The reservation fee, superfast surcharge and GST are charged in full. Where a concession is allowed on a Rajdhani, Shatabdi or Jan Shatabdi, it applies instead to the all-inclusive charge including catering.
Minimum journey of 300 km
Waived for students, blind and orthopaedically handicapped passengers, and for the listed patient categories — which is most of the people who still hold a concession.
Always calculated on Mail/Express fares
Whatever the train actually is, the concessional fare is worked out from the Mail/Express scale.
Only one concession at a time
Two entitlements cannot be combined, and the passenger chooses which one to use.
Granted at the counter, never on the train
Concessional tickets are issued at reservation and booking offices. A ticket checker cannot grant one on board, however genuine the entitlement, and a concession ticket cannot be upgraded to a higher class by paying the difference.
The certificate has to exist before you book
Every surviving category needs paperwork — a railway-issued Divyangjan photo ID, a hospital certificate on the prescribed form, or a certificate from the institution — and documents issued outside India are not accepted.
Set the journey
Class, distance and train category — a concession is worked out on the Mail/Express fare whatever train you take.
Add each passenger
Pick the category per person: adult, a child by age and berth choice, or a Divyangjan, patient or student concession.
Choose the berth for children
For a child aged 5 to 11 this is the whole decision — half fare without a berth, full fare with one.
Read the effective saving
Each line shows the headline percentage and what it comes to once the reservation fee, superfast charge and GST are added back.
Arrange the paperwork
Every concession needs its certificate before you book — a ticket checker cannot grant one on the train.
This is the one rule that explains every disappointed conversation at a reservation counter. Indian Railways grants concessions on the basic fare only. The reservation fee, the superfast surcharge and GST are charged in full to everybody, concession or not.
So a 75% concession in AC 3-Tier over 800 km does not produce a quarter-price ticket — it produces about ₹340 against a full fare of ₹1,090, which is 69% off rather than 75%. The gap widens as the journey gets shorter, because the fixed charges stay the same size while the basic fare shrinks. The calculator shows both numbers on every line for exactly this reason.
Before 21 April 2016, a child aged 5 to 11 paid half fare and still got a berth. Since then, half fare buys no berth at all — the child shares yours — and a berth of their own costs the full adult fare. Nothing about that has been reversed, however many pages still say otherwise.
Over 800 km in Sleeper, the choice is roughly ₹225 sharing your berth against ₹405 with one of their own. On a daytime run that is easy. On an overnight journey with two adults and two children it is the difference between four berths and two, and it is worth deciding deliberately rather than discovering at the platform.
A child under 5 travels free but is likewise entitled to no berth, and carries no separate luggage allowance — their bags count against your own free allowance.
Concession tickets are issued at the counter and the quotas fill from the moment booking opens. The booking-date calculator tells you when that is.
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Last reviewed
August 27, 2026
Content update
Auto-updated on Jun 28, 2026
Scope: The child fare rule and the general concession rules — basic fare only, the 300 km minimum and its exemptions, counter issue — are taken from the Indian Railways general rules for concession and the 2016 child fare notification. Category percentages are reproduced from the IRCA Coaching Tariff table as published by secondary sources and are labelled as such on each result. Fare components come from the site's own fare engine and are estimates.
Two questions bring people here and both have a stale answer almost everywhere they are asked. Children aged 5 to 11 have not automatically travelled at half fare with a berth since April 2016, and senior citizens have not received a fare concession since March 2020. Neither was quietly reversed.
This calculator works out what each passenger in a party actually pays, using the same fare engine as the rest of the site, and shows the one thing a percentage table cannot: what a concession comes to once the reservation fee, superfast surcharge and GST are added back at full price.
Two adults and one child aged 8 travelling 800 km in Sleeper on a superfast train: the adults pay ₹405 each, and the child pays ₹225 without a berth — a saving of ₹180, or 44%, not the 50% that “half fare” implies. Ask for a berth for the child and that saving disappears entirely.
Concessional fare = basic fare × (1 − concession %) + reservation fee + superfast surcharge + GST, with the last three at full rate. A child aged 5 to under 12 without a berth uses the same shape with the concession fixed at 50%; a child under 5 without a berth is issued no ticket at all. Concessions need a journey of 300 km unless the category is exempt, cannot be combined with each other, and are generally not admissible on Rajdhani and Shatabdi services.
A child under 5 travels free and is not issued a ticket, but gets no berth. From 5 up to under 12 a ticket is required, and the fare depends entirely on whether you ask for a separate berth: half the basic fare without one, the full adult fare with one. Age is reckoned on the date of the journey, so a child who turns 12 mid-trip is charged as an adult for the outward leg only.
Only without a berth. Since 21 April 2016, a child aged 5 to under 12 allotted a separate berth pays the full adult fare. Choosing no separate berth means half the basic fare — and the child shares your berth. Over 800 km in Sleeper that is about ₹225 against ₹405 for an adult, a saving of 44% rather than the 50% the phrase "half fare" suggests.
No. The 40% concession for men aged 60 and above and 50% for women aged 58 and above was withdrawn on 20 March 2020 and has not been restored. What continues is the lower-berth allotment preference for senior citizens, which is an allocation rule rather than a discount, and the senior citizen quota in the reservation system.
Four Divyangjan categories, eleven patient categories and a set of student categories. Everything else — journalists, sportspersons, teachers, unemployed youth, doctors, senior citizens — was withdrawn in March 2020 and remains withdrawn.
No, and this is the most common disappointment at the counter. A concession applies to the basic fare only: the reservation fee, the superfast surcharge and GST are charged in full. A 75% concession in AC 3-Tier over 800 km works out at about 69% off the ticket as a whole.
Yes — 300 km, but with wide exemptions. Students, blind and orthopaedically handicapped passengers and all the listed patient categories are exempt, which covers most people who still hold a concession. Child fares are not affected by it at all.
Only for categories that support prior registration — the Divyangjan concession in particular requires the railway-issued concession ID to be registered against your IRCTC account before you can book online. Everything else is issued across the counter at a reservation office, on production of the certificate. A ticket checker cannot grant a concession on board, however genuine the entitlement.
Only for a few categories: Divyangjan, and cancer, kidney and thalassaemia patients, plus families of martyrs. Student and most other concessions cannot be combined with Tatkal or Premium Tatkal.