Bhubaneswar: Vehicles passing through toll plazas will soon have to pay taxes through Radio Frequency Identification (RFID)-based tag called FASTag thanks to the National Electronic Collection (NETC) programme to be implemented by the National Highways Authority of India in order to remove bottlenecks and ensure seamless movement of traffic.
FASTag is a device that employs (RFID) technology and is affixed on the windscreen of the assigned vehicle and enables a customer to make toll payments directly from a linked account.
The Union Ministry of Road Transport and Highways has mandated that all toll payments shall be made via FASTag with effect from December 2019. In order to mobilise the new facility in pan India, the Union Ministry will organise a conference on ‘One Nation-One FASTag’ relating to inclusion of State/City Toll Plazas under NETC Programme on October 14.
It may be noted that toll plazas under the jurisdiction of State authorities are still collecting toll manually and such practice is resulting in traffic congestion leading to higher levels of fuel consumption and vehicular emissions.
Several toll gates on busy national and State highways like Puri-Bhubaneswar, Sambalpur-Jharsuguda Biju Expressway continue to face acute traffic problems due to manual system of toll collection.
“Collection of taxes manually causes lot of inconvenience to motorists, be it delay in our journey or pollution by more emissions,” said a truck driver.
Experts say that the implementation of the new facility will help check revenue leakage at the toll plazas, better audit control, consolidation of traffic data, less operating cost for toll operators.