From now, vehicles without the Fastag option will have to pay double the toll fee at toll plazas. From February 15 onwards, the government has made it mandatory for vehicles to have FASTag while driving on highways.

There are still many who have not gotten FASTag installed on their vehicles. They would have to pay double the normal toll across all the plazas in the country.

The ministry has decided that all the lanes at a toll plaza will henceforth be Fastag lane.

The idea behind this move is to make sure there is more payment through digital mode. The government has been trying to increase the usage of digital payment across the country for a long time. The FASTags also reduce the amount of time each traveller has to wait at the plaza.

On January 1, 2021, the ministry already mandated the use of FASTags in M&N categories of motor vehicles. Category M is for motor vehicles which have at least four wheels and are used for carrying passengers whereas category N vehicles are those with at least four wheels used for carrying goods but may also carry people.

For those who are expecting an extension of the deadline on this move, there is no such luck. Nitin Gadkari, the Road Transport and Highways Minister announced on Sunday that the deadline for implementation of FASTag would not be extended further. He added that all vehicle owners should immediately adopt the e-payment option.

FASTags were originally introduced in the country in 2016. Since then it has been a slow transition across the country for many to shift to them rather than using conventional payment. These tags, however, make it very easy to go through toll plazas as the fee would be paid electronically.

Image Credit: vijay chennupati from Sydney, Australia / CC BY 2.0 <>, via Wikimedia Commons

Source: Toll Gate

Image Reference: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Toll_gate_on_Vijayawada_to_Visakhapatnam_highway.jpeg