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China's train strain

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-01-24 20:34

But the official explanation has failed to satisfy passengers, and even seems to have inflamed resentment against the train ticketing monopoly of the railway department.

Vice Railway Minister Wang Zhiguo speaked at a new conference at Beijing, Thursday January 15, 2009. Rail police have already seized 4,069 scalpers in a clampdown since December, the MOR said. [people.com.cn]

Some netizens have even accused railway officials of saving tickets for government departments and colluding with scalpers.

Related coverage:  SpringFestival 2009 Related readings:  Grim weather to hamper Spring Festival travel rush  Reward offered for tip-off on scalpers  Inspection teams target scalpers and ticket selling  Rush to travel back home begins in earnest

The vice-mayor of Siping (Jilin Province, northeast China), Li Ou, wrote on his blog that the public security authorities would arrest more scalpers inside the ticket offices at railway stations than outside. "Arresting scalpers is treating the symptoms, but not curing the disease. Only when you get inside the railway departments, can you get to the cause", explained Li.

Deputy Railways Minister Wang Zhiguo says 30,000 police officers are keeping order at railway stations. So far, they have detained 2,390 scalpers and confiscated 78,200 tickets.

Wang says ticket vendors are not allowed to carry mobile phones to their windows to prevent them from colluding with scalpers.

Many have suggested that a real-name registration system for ticket sales as a possible solution to the problem.

A total of 77 percent of 80,000 people polled in a survey conducted by the portal Sina.com on Monday voted for the implementation of that kind of measure, but the official from the ministry's Public Security Bureau Zhang Qinghe has already said that system would not solve the problem of insufficient capacity.

"It is understood that the capacity lags behind demand, but ordinary people want to know how these insufficient resources can be distributed fairly and transparently," says Wang Xixin, a law professor at Peking University. A real-name ticketing system should be discussed publicly, instead of being rejected as "unfeasible", Wang says.

As the Spring Festival approaches, Cheng Bingchuan is ready to go home. Waiting to board the train at the Beijing South Railway Station, Cheng fiddles with his train ticket.  "The thing is, I feel very grateful to the scalper. How ironic is this?" he says.

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