Mukh Mantri Teerth Yatra Yojana

What is Mukh Mantri Teerth Yatra Yojana?

Mukh Mantri Teerth Yatra Yojana is a fully state-funded pilgrimage scheme of the Government of Punjab, administered through the Department of Tourism and Cultural Affairs with district administrations doing the registration and dispatch. The scheme pays for a Punjab resident aged 50 or above to travel to a major religious site anywhere in India, stay there and eat, without spending anything of their own.

The scheme was launched on 27 November 2023, when the first fully paid pilgrimage train carrying Punjab residents left for Sri Hazur Sahib at Nanded in Maharashtra. Punjab allocated in the region of Rs 100 crore for the scheme's implementation across the state.

A second phase was launched in October 2025, dedicated to the 350th martyrdom anniversary of the ninth Sikh Guru, Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji, with the destination list expanded and online registration opened for eligible senior citizens.

The scheme is often written locally as Mukh Mantri Teerth Yatra Yojna or simply the Teerth Yatra scheme, and readers searching either spelling are looking at the same programme.

What does the scheme actually cover?

The government bears the cost of:

• Travel to the pilgrimage site, by air-conditioned bus for nearer destinations and by train for distant ones such as Nanded.
• Lodging at or near the destination for the duration of the yatra.
• Meals through the journey and the stay.
• Other essential facilities arranged for the group, including escort and medical support on the larger trains.

What the scheme does not do is reimburse a pilgrimage a person arranges privately. The benefit is an organised, government-run trip in a group; there is no cash component and nothing is credited to a bank account. A resident who books a train ticket to Vaishno Devi and then asks the district office for the money back has misunderstood the scheme entirely.

Which destinations are covered?

Across the phases run so far, the destinations reported include:

• Sri Hazur Sahib, Nanded (Maharashtra), the destination of the first train in November 2023
• Sri Amritsar Sahib, the Golden Temple
• Mata Vaishno Devi, Katra, Jammu
• Haridwar and Rishikesh
• Mathura and Vrindavan
• Ajmer Sharif

The government announced a further expansion of the destination list when the second phase opened. The precise list, and the number of seats allotted per destination, are notified for each phase, so check what is on offer for the phase currently open rather than relying on an older list.

Who is eligible for Mukh Mantri Teerth Yatra Yojana?

You can register if:

• You are a resident of Punjab.
• You are 50 years of age or above on the date of registration.
• You belong to any caste, any religion and any income group, the scheme carries no BPL condition and no income ceiling.
• You are medically fit to travel, which matters for the longer train journeys and is checked in some phases.

You cannot apply if:

• You are under 50 years of age. The age line is the scheme's principal filter.
• You are not a resident of Punjab. Residence, not birth in Punjab, is what counts, and Aadhaar with a Punjab address is the usual proof.
• You are medically unfit for the journey in the assessment of the district administration, particularly for multi-day rail travel.
• The registration window for the phase has closed. This is phase-based, not an all-year scheme, and a late applicant waits for the next phase.

Being selected is a separate question from being eligible. Seats on each train and bus are finite, so eligible registrations are shortlisted against the seats available for each destination and district.

How to apply for the Punjab Teerth Yatra scheme

1. Wait for a registration phase to open. The district administration and the state government announce the window; registration is not continuously open.
2. Go to your nearest Sewa Kendra or the Deputy Commissioner's office in your district with your Aadhaar card, passport-size photographs and a working mobile number. Online registration is also opened during a phase.
3. Fill the registration form, giving your age, address, preferred destination and the mobile number on which you will receive updates.
4. Submit the form and collect the acknowledgement carrying your registration number. Keep it, every later query is traced through it.
5. Watch for the SMS confirming selection, which carries the destination, the reporting point and the departure date.
6. Report at the specified boarding point on the departure date with your Aadhaar card and the travel document issued to you.

Applicants who need help with the online form can have it filled by the Sewa Kendra operator; there is no separate paper-only channel that bypasses the district administration.

How do I check whether I have been selected?

Selection is communicated by SMS to the registered mobile number, which is why a working number is treated as a mandatory item rather than an optional one. Beyond that:

1. Contact the Deputy Commissioner's office of your district with your registration number.
2. Ask the Sewa Kendra where you registered, which can pull up the application record.
3. Where a phase runs online registration, check the status through the same login used to register.

Lists are drawn destination by destination and district by district, so a neighbour being selected for Nanded says nothing about your position on the Vaishno Devi list.

How the phases work, and why that matters

Mukh Mantri Teerth Yatra Yojana does not run as a continuously open scheme with a standing beneficiary list. It runs in phases, and understanding that structure explains most of what readers find confusing about it.

Each phase carries its own notified destination list, its own registration window, its own seat allocation per district and, in some cases, its own conditions on medical fitness and attendants. A rule that applied in the first phase is not automatically the rule in the next. The first phase opened in November 2023 and sent its first train to Sri Hazur Sahib at Nanded; the second opened in October 2025 with an expanded destination list, tied to the 350th martyrdom anniversary of Sri Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji.

Three consequences follow for anyone planning to apply.

Registration is time-bound. A resident who walks into a Sewa Kendra between phases will be told to come back, and that is correct — there is no standing list to be added to. Watch for the district administration's announcement.

A rejection is usually not permanent. Because seats are finite and applications commonly exceed them, most unsuccessful registrations are simply the result of oversubscription for a particular destination in a particular district. Registering again in the next phase is the normal remedy, not an appeal.

The destination list grows. Sites have been added between phases, so a destination that was unavailable in one phase may appear in the next. Checking the current phase's list rather than an older news report avoids a wasted trip to the Sewa Kendra.

Who runs the scheme on the ground?

Policy sits with the Department of Tourism and Cultural Affairs, Punjab, but almost everything a pilgrim deals with sits with the district administration.

The Deputy Commissioner's office of each district handles registration intake, verifies age and residence, prepares the district's shortlist against the seats allotted to it, and organises the departure. Sewa Kendras are the public counter. They take the form, capture the documents and issue the acknowledgement, and they can correct a data-entry error in an existing record. The transport arrangements for the road legs draw on the state's own bus fleet, and the rail legs are run as chartered pilgrimage trains from designated stations.

This division explains why a question about seat availability cannot be answered by a Sewa Kendra operator and has to go to the Deputy Commissioner's office, and equally why a spelling mistake in your name is fixed at the Sewa Kendra rather than at the DC office.

Common reasons a registration does not result in a trip

• Registered after the phase window closed, so the form was never taken into that phase's list.
• Age below 50 at the date of registration.
• Residence proof does not show a Punjab address, most often an Aadhaar card never updated after moving.
• Mobile number wrong or unreachable, so the selection SMS never arrived and the seat was reallocated.
• Medical fitness not established for a long journey.
• Oversubscription: more eligible registrations than seats for that destination, which is the commonest outcome and is not a rejection on merit. Register again in the next phase.

Where to ask questions or complain

The Deputy Commissioner's office of your district is the working authority for this scheme, it handles registration, shortlisting and dispatch, and a grievance about any of those belongs there. Sewa Kendras can retrieve a registration record and correct a data entry error. State-level policy questions go to the Department of Tourism and Cultural Affairs, Punjab.

Registration is free and the pilgrimage is fully funded by the state. No agent, tout or intermediary can secure a seat for a payment, and any demand for money in exchange for a place on the yatra list should be reported immediately to the Deputy Commissioner's office.