Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation Ltd (IRCTC) floated a tender to onboard a consultant to monetise passenger data, including basic user details such as name, address, phone number, age, email ID, payment mode, class of journey, and even login and passwords. The tender mentioned that the revenue generation potential of the initiative would be to the tune of ₹1,000 crore. A nationwide furore followed, topped by a summons to its top officials by the Parliamentary Standing Committee on IT, then led by Shashi Tharoor. Before the date of the summons, the company decided to withdraw the tender at its AGM. Due to flip-flops like these, financial consultancy firm Prabhudas Lilladher maintains a neutral stance on the company. “Its data monetisation plans got cancelled because it was related to some data breach in the privacy of users. It had
