Stopping road developers from collecting toll being mulled

The Ministry for Road Transport and Highways is studying a proposal by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) to stop private developers from collecting toll on highway widening projects during the construction phase if the project falls behind schedule.

Currently, private developers are allowed to collect full toll on stretches which are being widened from four to six lanes and the NHAI has proposed that the toll be cancelled if the projects are delayed.

Senior officials in the ministry have confirmed that a proposal was sent by the NHAI chairman on Monday evening and the ministry was yet to start studying the proposal.

“We have not started studying the content of the proposal. The ministry would take at least a few weeks to study the proposal and revert to it,” an official at the ministry said.

The decision to allow developers to start collecting toll from the day work starts on widening the stretch has often been criticised as it helps developers receive revenue despite failing to meet deadlines. A number of projects including the Gurgaon-Jaipur project have been cited to be behind schedule and the NHAI wants to penalise developers who have been going slow on projects.  “If you look at the toll structure, all four lane highways are tolled. Once a developer is assigned to widen the four lanes to six lanes, instead of putting sufficient resources from his side, he uses the full toll rate for the construction of the six lane,” a senior NHAI official said.

This causes projects to be delayed and the developer has to be punished,”

The NHAI has been struggling to award projects during the past few years due to a variety of reasons and had recently cancelled six projects where work could not take off. Among the projects cancelled were two in Kerala and two in Goa.

Last year, the ministry of roads could only award a little more than 1,000 kilometres of road projects and the Prime Minister had expressed concerns over the delay in road development. The delay, largely caused by environmental clearance and land acquisition, had forced many private sector investors to stay away from road projects.