After its forays into e-ticketing and hospitality, the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation has tied up with travel major Cox & Kings for offering tour packages.

The agency will act as a general sales agent for the IRCTC. The corporation has appointed 16 more GSAs all across the country.

Under the agreement, the railways will provide for the train journey, while the agency will take care of everything else, right from the post-train journey to boarding and lodging.

Railway ministry sources said the GSAs would get commission from the corporation for their services, which would vary from case to case.

The packages will be for locations, which attract the maximum number of tourists all over the year, especially places of religious interest.

Interested passengers will get tickets from an IRCTC quota. Government sources said, to begin with, 15 to 20 seats in particular trains were being offered under these packages. Passengers opting for the packages will make a one-time payment.

On Friday, passengers availed the package for Kolkata-Darjeeling trains. The Mumbai-Shirdi route and the Delhi-Jammu-Katra railroad route for Vaishno Devi pilgrims will be covered under the scheme from January 2007.