It was 7:00 am. Yup, I woke up so early but for a reason. Only one hour to go. There was a call with my manager @ 9:30. I should leave from my home by 8:45 so as I could reach my office on time. Thought for a second, one of the quotes I adore the most (when you wake up from your bed, you have two options, 1) go back to sleep and dream 2) Wake up and start chasing your dreams). I finally settled to go to bathroom not to chase my dreams but you know, ya you know to have a bath ;) . The clock ticked 7:35 and only 25 more minutes. I got dressed up in a few minutes and opened my company’s laptop. Switched on the Wi-Fi, opened the website and I am ready but still 15 minutes to go. Yes, I have to book a Tatkal train ticket for my uncle from Tuticorin to Chennai. He told me to book in 3-Ac, and I know there will be a very few number of seats. He told me to book for 7 people. Only after opening the website I realized the website only allows a maximum of 6 persons to be booked. I told Mouli to switch on his computer so that I could book 4 tickets and he could do the rest. He told me to do via Quickbook. The page is opened and I noted the train number and passenger details. We were ready!!
7: 58 7:59 Go…
Yes, the Tatkal seats were open. 20 Ac tickets. I had to book 7(a tough task rite). I started filling the details as soon as possible (may be in less than a min) and clicked the “Pay” button. I love Google Chrome and I was using that (until then I realized about its compatibility issues). I was waiting for the payment gateway option and gosh, damn I found “The webpage could not found. Please try again later”. Completely taken aback, I opened the website again but hardly opened. In the mean time my friend entered the payment gateway using his computer and he was filling my credit card number and other details for payment. I told him the CVV number but in a hurry he typed it wrongly and clicked ‘ok’. Gone!!! (Master Security sir!!) Again he had to start from the beginning and I was not able to open the website itself. Finally I opened and he too. By the time the seat count had gone to 7. So I told him to book for 6 and I would book for one person (this damn laptop or Wi-Fi was bloody slow). He entered the details for 6 persons and checked the availability. The count had reduced to 5. Deleted one person and clicked the “Pay”. I told him to enter the credit card number and pin with no hurry and finally the ticket was booked for 5 persons.
My friend checked the 2-Ac ticket availability and there were 5 seats available. I called up my dad and got the approval for booking 2-AC ticket. Entered the details for the remaining 2 and he once again checked the availability and it was still 5. Having heaved a sigh of relief, we proceeded for payment. Payment was done and we were completely numb on seeing the e-ticket. It showed WL1 and WL2.
It was 8:45 then. Losing my patience, I went to the office with heavy disappointment. Since then I was checking the PNR status. Both the 2-Ac tickets got confirmed 2 days before the journey. Finally I getting up at 7 am(very rarely happens) was not futile.
Overall IRCTC Tatkal ticket booking to me is
“Insane Resentment Camouflage Tiresome & Conscientious“
