Road travel set to become more expensive as toll charges increase from midnight today, is it justified?

There will be a countrywide increase in highway toll charges from Monday, June 03, 2024 effective from midnight today, impacting nearly 1100 toll plazas across the country.

This annual increase in toll rates was put on hold due to general elections in the country.

Toll charges in India are revised annually to keep up with inflation, with highway operators announcing hikes of 3% to 5% at nearly 1,100 toll plazas starting from Monday.

Notices of these increases are typically published in local newspapers.

A senior official at the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) said, “As the election process is over, the revision of user fee (toll) rates, which was put on hold during the elections, would become effective from June 3.”

The official justified that hikes in toll charges and taxation on fuel products help finance the expansion of national highways.

However, opposition parties and many motorists criticize the annual rise in charges, arguing that it increases the transport costs of essential commodities and burdens commuters.

The country has invested large sums of money over the last decade to expand its national highways, now spanning about 146,000 kilometers, making it the second-largest road network in the world.

Toll collections jumped to more than 54000 crore in the 2022-23, up from 25200 crore in 2018-19. This increase was driven by a rise in road traffic as well as by the growth in the number of toll plazas and the charges levied.

However, many citizens have questioned that despite building highways and upgrading road infrastructure, plethora of problems like frequent traffic jams, indiscipline on the roads, and accidents continue to plague our highways.

Many highways are always choked because the heavy vehicles, often overloaded and poorly maintained, occupy all three lanes and move at snarls pace for kilometers at a stretch, causing a nightmare for the drivers stuck behind.