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The use of FASTag may increase exponentially on National Highways from December 1, as toll plaza windows in all lanes of National Highways across the country will start accepting FASTag, the RFID chips on each vehicle.
The present rule mandates at least one lane accepts Fastag.
This will change starting December when toll plazas transactions may become tedious for people paying by cash. A notification said that only one lane would be allowed to accept toll in cash mode.
More than half of toll plazas located across National Highways have already converted all their lanes with technology that accept toll payments electronically through FASTag, the RFID tags with unique identification numbers for each vehicle.
“With effect from December 1, we expect all lanes of National Highways to accept FASTag, the electronic tolling system,” said Nitin Gadkari, Road Transport and Highways Minister, where the plan to connect Fastag with GSTN was being announced. The move will enable users to zoom through toll plazas on national highways by making payments electronically.
Of the 527 toll plazas across National Highways, 380 got FASTag in all lanes, while more lanes are being made Fastag-enabled, the Minister added.
The Ministry has already mandated all new trucks, buses, cars to have FASTag. “Use of FASTag will lower queueing time at toll plazas. This will also be good from a security perspective for the Home Ministry as the details of the person in the vehicle as well as who is travelling from where to where will also be available,” said Gadkari.
The Minister also requested various states, which have different kinds of toll collecting technology, to use the same technology as FASTag. This will allow users to use FASTag at all state highways.
“We will provide this technology for free to States who use this technology. I would request all states to use the same technology. Also, we will fund 50 per cent of cost required to build toll plazas,” said Gadkari.
Out of 1.4 lakh km of National Highways, some 25,000 km were tolled till 2018, and another 2,000 km are expected to be tolled by December, 2019, he further added.
The FASTag, each of which has a unique identification number, store data such as vehicle registration and class of vehicle, which help arrive at the exact toll to be charged. They have encrypted vehicle data such as engine and chassis number. These are also enabled to store other vehicle compliance-related data, including those related to emissions or pollution and insurance.
Here are some key takeways for FASTags, the Vehicle Aadhaar
* Some 60 lakh tags are in use
* Daily transactions of 10 lakh
* Point of sales to be increased to 50,000 from 28,000 by December
* All lanes of over 70 % toll plazas already enabled for Electronic Tolling
* Parking at Hyderabad Airport to start accepting Fastag
* NHAI asks States for law and order support to implement electronic tolling
* There will be one lane, on each side of the road, that will accept cash. It will also cater to over-dimensioned (larger than usual size) vehicles
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