Vehicles passing through NH toll plazas and not having FASTag onboard will have to cough up twice the toll fee from the midnight of February 15-16, Times of India reports.
The Union Road and Transport ministry declared in an order, “It has been decided that all the lanes in the fee plazas on National Highways shall be declared as ‘FASTag lane of the fee plaza’ w.e.f. midnight of 15th /16th February 2021.”
FASTags have been made mandatory for all motor vehicles from 1 January 2021 onward. The ministry added, “Therefore, as per NH Fee Rules 2008, any vehicle not fitted with FASTag or vehicle without valid, functional “FASTag” entering into the ‘FASTag lane’ of the fee plaza shall pay a fee equivalent to two times of the fee applicable to that category.”
To promote the modernization of toll collection, the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has established 40,000 points of sale (PoS) to give rise to on-the-spot purchase of FASTags. The central government has asked for support from enforcement agencies across different states for smoother implementation of FASTag across the national highway network.
The FASTag technology enables automatic electronic payment of toll fees at plazas and enhances transparency in revenue collection and maintenance. It paves the way for uninterrupted movement of vehicles and helps in saving fuel and time.