By accepting credit and debit cards for the first time at the inter-venue Mysore races on Wednesday, the Royal Calcutta Turf Club has created history of sorts and may have started a trend which could very well be here to stay.

 Speaking to www.indiarace.com, ceo Kothari commented: “It’s really too early to say whether credit and debit cards will become a permanent feature at RCTC. We were happy with the response on the first day of experimentation as the attendance at the Mysore inter-venue races is always less than at other centres like Bangalore, Mumbai and Pune. Yet, we accepted a total of Rs 62,000/- in credit and debit card betting.”

Kothari added “On Wednesday, we had only two card-swipe machines operating – one at the grandstand near the bookmakers ring and one at the Reserve Stand. For the Kolkata races on Friday, we would like to add one more at the Members Stand. There will be no upper limit to the amount that one can play by credit or debit card but the minimum amount should be Rs 100/-. TDS will be deducted as usual for payments above Rs 10,000/- while payments above Rs 20,000/- will be made by cheque.”

As no government permission is needed for increasing the number of card-swiping machines, RCTC could very well add a few more in the months to follow. However, the main practical problem that one faces with these machines is the time taken to issue the tickets. “It is considerably more than the time taken at the cash counters. The link gives a problem at times and that slows down things a lot. Anyway, let us be optimistic and hope that it becomes an user friendly tool for punters”, added the ceo.

Meanwhile, it is learnt that at least 10 bookmakers will be operating at the Kolkata races of Friday. So, it does seem that things may be looking up for punters at RCTC at last after the severe cash-crunch post demonetisation.