The Metro fleet will go up from Monday with more trains in non rush hours, said officials.

Also, the epass system will be operational only during the rush hours from Monday.

“From December 14, we plan to run 216 trains from Monday to Saturday,” a Metro official said. The number of weekday trains went up to 204 from 190 on December 7. The timings were also expanded. The first and last trains now leave the terminal stations at 7am and 9.30pm, respectively.

The additional trains will be run from 11pm to 5pm, said an official.

The epass window is also being shortened gradually to make the carrier available for all throughout the day, said sources in Metro.

Women, children (15 years and below) and senior citizens (60 years and above) do not need an epass throughout the day.

Other passengers need an epass to enter the station except between 7am and 8.30am, and post 8pm.

From Monday, epass will be mandatory only from 8.30am to 11am and from 5pm to 8pm. Outside these two rush hour windows, anyone can enter a station without an epass.

“The rush hours have been very busy. But around one-third of the slots between 11am and 5pm are usually vacant. Many people who want to travel during that slot are probably thwarted by the epass system,” said a Metro official.

But the system would be essential for crowd control during rush hours, he pointed out.

The passenger count of Calcutta Metro breached the 1,00,000mark on November 18, for the first time since the resumption of services on September 14 and a week into the resumption of suburban railway services on November 11.

The usual weekday passenger count is now above 1,15,000. On Monday, the count was over 1,24,000.