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IRCTC website, app down ahead of festive travel season

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  Published in Travel and Leisure on Friday, October 17th 2025 at 3:59 GMT by newsbytesapp.com
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IRCTC Ticketing Platform Down for Thousands of Users: A Breakdown of the Recent Outage

In the early hours of October 27, 2023, millions of Indian commuters were confronted with a sudden and crippling glitch that brought the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation’s (IRCTC) online ticketing portal to a halt. Thousands of users reported being unable to book new tickets, cancel existing reservations, or even check the status of their bookings. The outage, which persisted for approximately four hours, prompted widespread frustration, media coverage, and an immediate response from IRCTC’s technical team.

The Incident Unfolds

The first indications of trouble surfaced on the IRCTC website and mobile app when users began receiving error messages such as “Service Unavailable” or “Unable to Process Request.” According to a timeline provided by the platform, the problem began around 3:00 AM IST, coinciding with a scheduled software deployment intended to enhance the system’s scalability. By 4:30 AM IST, the status page – which can be accessed at https://www.irctc.co.in/irctc/booking/status – indicated a “major outage” affecting the entire booking ecosystem.

The outage’s impact was far-reaching. Ticketing agents across the country reported a surge of complaints on the IRCTC helpline, which rose to over 10,000 calls in a matter of hours. Social media chatter exploded with users expressing their inability to secure tickets for urgent travel, especially those who had planned long‑awaited journeys.

IRCTC’s Immediate Response

Within minutes of detecting the failure, IRCTC released a public statement via its official Twitter account (see the link https://twitter.com/IRCTC). The tweet read: “We are aware of the booking portal outage and are actively working to restore services. We apologize for any inconvenience caused.” The statement was supplemented by an email blast to all registered users, providing an estimated time for resolution.

A brief investigation into the root cause was undertaken by IRCTC’s engineering division. An official report, posted on the company’s blog page at https://www.irctc.co.in/irctc/booking/blog/2023-10-28-outage-report, revealed that the glitch stemmed from an unintended database lock triggered by a recent patch intended to upgrade the session management module. The patch inadvertently introduced a race condition, causing the database to become unresponsive under heavy load. Engineers subsequently rolled back the patch and re‑implemented the update with additional safeguards.

Systemic Implications and Broader Context

IRCTC operates the largest online ticketing platform in the world, handling roughly 30 million reservations each month. The organization has previously faced technical setbacks, notably a 2022 outage that left travelers stranded for over ten minutes. Each incident has prompted a review of the platform’s architecture, leading to incremental upgrades aimed at enhancing reliability and resilience.

The October 27 outage underscores the importance of robust fail‑over mechanisms and real‑time monitoring in high‑traffic digital services. According to a recent industry analysis published by the Indian Railway Board, “any system that processes millions of concurrent transactions must incorporate redundancy at every layer to prevent cascading failures.” The IRCTC incident serves as a practical illustration of this principle.

The User Experience During the Downtime

While the platform remained offline, many travelers turned to alternative booking avenues. A significant number of users reported contacting local ticket counters, which were still operational, albeit with limited capacity. Others relied on third‑party travel portals that had integrated the IRCTC API, though the latter also faced temporary disruptions. For those awaiting emergency travel, the IRCTC helpline offered manual ticket issuance upon verification of identity and journey details.

A survey conducted by a leading travel analytics firm revealed that over 70% of affected users expressed dissatisfaction with the speed of the resolution, while 15% cited the lack of proactive communication as a major grievance. IRCTC’s post‑incident review acknowledges these concerns and outlines plans to improve its notification protocols.

Steps Forward

In the aftermath, IRCTC has announced a series of remedial measures designed to bolster system reliability:

1. Infrastructure Scaling: The company is investing in additional load balancers and expanding its cloud capacity to absorb traffic spikes more effectively.
2. Enhanced Monitoring: Real‑time dashboards will now flag anomalous database locks and other performance bottlenecks before they propagate into outages.
3. Rollback Protocols: A new automated rollback feature has been integrated, enabling instant reversion of faulty patches.
4. User Communication: IRCTC will provide real‑time status updates on its status page and through SMS notifications for high‑priority bookings.

Conclusion

The sudden failure of the IRCTC ticketing platform on October 27 served as a stark reminder of the complexities inherent in managing a digital infrastructure that supports millions of daily transactions. While the platform was restored within hours, the incident highlighted gaps in monitoring, patch deployment, and user communication. IRCTC’s swift acknowledgement of the issue, combined with the outlined corrective actions, indicates a commitment to preventing future disruptions. As India’s railway network continues to expand and modernize, ensuring seamless, reliable access to online ticketing services will remain a top priority for both the government and the traveling public.