The Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) has withdrawn a tender published earlier to hire a consultant to monetize passenger data. The update was provided by a senior IRCTC official to a parliamentary panel led by Congress leader Shashi Tharoor on Friday. The railway company had announced the tender in the second half of this month. The tender sparked controversy over privacy concerns regarding the monetization of passenger and freight customer data. IRCTC has now informed that it is no longer pursuing the tender.
According to a report in PTI, IRCTC MD and chairperson Rajni Hasija testified on Friday along with other officials from the Shashi Tharoor-led Parliamentary Standing Committee on Information Technology. The panel summoned IRCTC officials following reports announcing a tender for the appointment of a consultant for digital data monetization.
IRCTC officials confirmed to the panel that the company is no longer pursuing the tender. An IRCTC official informed the panel, “IRCTC has withdrawn the tender in the light of non-approval of the Data Protection Bill.”
Railway ticketing company decided to withdraw the tender IRCTC the annual general meeting on Friday, which was scheduled summon in front of the panel.
through tender, published In the second half of August, IRCTC sought to study and monetize the data including information such as “name, age, mobile number, gender, address, e-mail id, class of travel, payment mode, login or password” and other details. Of. ,