India's electronic toll collection could surpass ₹80,000 crore in this financial year, with the first six months registering a robust collection of ₹40,433.16 crore against ₹34,088.88 crore a year ago, an increase of 18.6%. It comes on the back of higher freight movement expected in the second half of this fiscal to cater to the festival demand. The collection for 2024-25 stood at more than ₹72,930.83 crore, official data showed.
In the first six months of 2025-26, the volume of toll users went up 13.5% to 2,247.23 million from 1,980 million in the year-ago period.
Kuljit Singh, partner and national leader Infrastructure, EY India, said there has been a healthy growth in toll revenue in the past few years, driven by increase in length of tolled highways and increase in traffic. "Going forward, the government has ambitious targets to nearly double the toll collections. It is also taking steps to cushion the users from significant increase in toll collection by implementing steps such as annual toll pass, reducing inflation indexation of tolls, reviewing the pace of roll out of new tolled highway projects etc," he said.
The surge in toll collection between April and September happened despite the fact that collection dropped to the lowest in the current fiscal in September after the introduction of the annual toll pass, effective from August 15, which benefited toll users but impacted the government's toll revenue.
The National Electronic Toll Collection data showed September collection at ₹6,421.49 crore, compared to ₹6,661.10 crore in August, ₹6,669.12 crore in July, ₹6,793.40 crore in June, Rs 7,087.16 crore in May and Rs 6,801.37 crore in April.
"The year-on-year increase in annual toll collection is 18.6%. After adjusting for the April 2025 inflation-linked toll rate hike of around 4.5%, the underlying traffic-driven growth stands at roughly 14 %, underscoring strong highway usage and steady network expansion," said Jagannarayan Padmanabhan, senior director and global head, consulting, Crisil Intelligence. The government raised toll rates on expressways and national highways across the country by 4-5% with effect from April 1, linked to changes in the wholesale price index based inflation.
There are around 855 user fee plazas on the national highways network on which user fee is levied as per National Highways Fee (Determination of Rates and Collection) Rules, 2008. Out of these, around 675 are public-funded fee plazas and 180 are concessionaire-operated toll plazas.
In the first six months of 2025-26, the volume of toll users went up 13.5% to 2,247.23 million from 1,980 million in the year-ago period.
Kuljit Singh, partner and national leader Infrastructure, EY India, said there has been a healthy growth in toll revenue in the past few years, driven by increase in length of tolled highways and increase in traffic. "Going forward, the government has ambitious targets to nearly double the toll collections. It is also taking steps to cushion the users from significant increase in toll collection by implementing steps such as annual toll pass, reducing inflation indexation of tolls, reviewing the pace of roll out of new tolled highway projects etc," he said.
The surge in toll collection between April and September happened despite the fact that collection dropped to the lowest in the current fiscal in September after the introduction of the annual toll pass, effective from August 15, which benefited toll users but impacted the government's toll revenue.
The National Electronic Toll Collection data showed September collection at ₹6,421.49 crore, compared to ₹6,661.10 crore in August, ₹6,669.12 crore in July, ₹6,793.40 crore in June, Rs 7,087.16 crore in May and Rs 6,801.37 crore in April.
"The year-on-year increase in annual toll collection is 18.6%. After adjusting for the April 2025 inflation-linked toll rate hike of around 4.5%, the underlying traffic-driven growth stands at roughly 14 %, underscoring strong highway usage and steady network expansion," said Jagannarayan Padmanabhan, senior director and global head, consulting, Crisil Intelligence. The government raised toll rates on expressways and national highways across the country by 4-5% with effect from April 1, linked to changes in the wholesale price index based inflation.
There are around 855 user fee plazas on the national highways network on which user fee is levied as per National Highways Fee (Determination of Rates and Collection) Rules, 2008. Out of these, around 675 are public-funded fee plazas and 180 are concessionaire-operated toll plazas.
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