[GwD]

It is a demonstration of monopoly in action, a blatant exercise to forcibly collect funds from motorists. Personally, I use my XUV (with Fastag since 2016) for highway travel and the other cars only within the city. Now I will have to purchase Fastag for those for no reason but to help fill up government coffers. Where's the connection between insurance and highway toll? Who exactly benefits from this decision? Not the car owners for sure.

Originally Posted by Hayek

Seems like an incredibly nutty policy. Why should someone who never takes a car on toll highways waste money and time getting a Fastag installed. Cars have a registration plate - that is more than enough for the car to be traced and for insurance to be issued. Classic example of our government servants taking good ideas too far and finding new ways to harass people.

[drmohitg]

Is 500 bucks an amount big enough spread throughout your car's legal road life to merit this discussion? In that 500 Rs. also, the break up is as follows:

Tag price - Rs.100
One-time security deposit - Rs.250
Threshold amount - Rs.150

So the Rs. 250 security deposit is refundable when you close your account and surrender back the fast tag. Rs. 150 is your usable amount if you ever venture out on a toll road during the entire life of your car. Considering the unique scenario where your car never ever does that, you would end up wasting Rs. 250!

Now consider the scenario for people who do venture out on the highways, have bought a fast tag and still annoyingly are made to wait because some moron entered the wrong tag lane. With this rule, everyone would need to have a Fast tag eliminating the above scenario completely. Of course there still would be people who would have low balance and other tag related issues, but slowly and gradually, such problems would surely be smoothened out as more and more people would be aware of the Fast tag and how to use it correctly.

[Axe77]

Originally Posted by drmohitg

Is 500 bucks an amount big enough spread throughout your car's legal road life to merit this discussion? In that 500 Rs. also, the break up is as follows:

Tag price - Rs.100
One-time security deposit - Rs.250
Threshold amount - Rs.150

So the Rs. 250 security deposit is refundable when you close your account and surrender back the fast tag. Rs. 150 is your usable amount if you ever venture out on a toll road during the entire life of your car. Considering the unique scenario where your car never ever does that, you would end up wasting Rs. 250!

Now consider the scenario for people who do venture out on the highways, have bought a fast tag and still annoyingly are made to wait because some moron entered the wrong tag lane. With this rule, everyone would need to have a Fast tag eliminating the above scenario completely. Of course there still would be people who would have low balance and other tag related issues, but slowly and gradually, such problems would surely be smoothened out as more and more people would be aware of the Fast tag and how to use it correctly.

I am sorry but it is still a high handed and a ridiculous rule. And having a fastag is no guarantee that a moron will not leave his fastag with zero balance and still hold up everyone behind him at the toll.

You want people to comply? Charge a different higher toll fee if paid in cash in the cash lane. And an even higher amount with penalty if sought to be paid in the toll lane. Linking it to insurance still does not make sense to me.

[drmohitg]

Originally Posted by Axe77

I am sorry but it is still a high handed and a ridiculous rule. And having a fastag is no guarantee that a moron will not leave his fastag with zero balance and still hold up everyone behind him at the toll.

You want people to comply? Charge a different higher toll fee if paid in cash in the cash lane. And an even higher amount with penalty if sought to be paid in the toll lane. Linking it to insurance still does not make sense to me.

True. There would be better ways. And to be honest, I am a firm believer that nothing works better than enforcing high fines in India. Ever since the traffic fines have been increased and cameras installed at every nook and corner in Delhi, people have magically started stopping before the Stop line, keep their speed in check etc etc.

Also as far as I know, they are charging double toll from offenders who enter the wrong lane. However haven't come across anyone who has been charged the same, so I am not sure if it is being enforced.

My post was more directed towards the argument that the Fast Tag fees (Rs. 250) would be a gross injustice and financially affect the few owners who never venture out on highways. We can discuss the merits and demerits of this, but an amount of Rs. 250 is simply too small to matter to any car owner, spread over the entire legal road life of the car.

[ABHI_1512]

Also as far as I know, they are charging double toll from offenders who enter the wrong lane. However haven't come across anyone who has been charged the same, so I am not sure if it is being enforced.

Yes, I heard that too but frankly, till date never heard anyone who has been charged that way. In fact, people merrily enter fastag lanes and pay cash defeating the entire purpose. What the authorities could have done is to streamline the process instead of coming up with this plan of linking insurance with fastags. Better compliance would have resulted in greater penetration of fastags.

My post was more directed towards the argument that the Fast Tag fees (Rs. 250) would be a gross injustice and financially affect the few owners who never venture out on highways. We can discuss the merits and demerits of this, but an amount of Rs. 250 is simply too small to matter to any car owner, spread over the entire legal road life of the car.

And this is how the corpus builds. You see, we never take the cess component of fuel seriously and look how much revenue the government is earning now which makes the mockery of market prices of fuel. When market linked prices were introduced in the country, it was said that greater transparency will come and consumers will benefit by the low prices of crude and now look where we are

Every decision pushed down the throat has some kind of motive attached and I will not be surprised if sometime down the line it is said that to keep the fastag active you have to recharge every six months with the low amount that you have quoted(Rs. 250) or something else which we don't know yet. Why make something mandatory when only a fraction of people are using it anyways?

Penalize people who travel through the highways and don't use the fastags. Fine them twice or thrice the amount but why make someone pay for something not used by them !

[whitewing]

Babudom at its best.

If they want better adoption of FastTag on highways, they can choose to forbid entry on tolled roads for vehicles not having FastTag.

But why link it to insurance?

[RK79]

If the Govt wants to install FastTag in all cars, then make it a rule.Why club it with insurance? Some how I have a feeling that Govt is acting like a crooked shop owner, who sells comb along with soap when you want only soap. Not every village is covered by highways and toll plazas. They just want to extract 500 from every car owner, in a decent manner may be to balance the economic crisis.

[FrozeninTime]

Originally Posted by RK79

If the Govt wants to install FastTag in all cars, then make it a rule.Why club it with insurance? Some how I have a feeling that Govt is acting like a crooked shop owner, who sells comb along with soap when you want only soap. Not every village is covered by highways and toll plazas. They just want to extract 500 from every car owner, in a decent manner may be to balance the economic crisis.

I Feel these new rules are being enacted to make four wheeler ownership a hassle with ultimate aim to disincentives four wheeler ownership in long run to make public transport more popular and help generate local jobs.

Case in point being Delhi metro though great lacks last mile connectivity. These last mile connectivity is serviced by e rickshaws which not only generate employment but reduce carbon footprint.

[haisaikat]

I see several people complaining about Fastag on cars that never go to highways. You all should know that vision of the Government is to make use of Fastag for not just toll tax collection.

Its an avenue to increase cashless payments at other possible places like petrol pumps, parking lots, and many more areas where you stand in queues to make a payment even using other payment methods. One one hand your wait time will be reduced but also on the other hand the government gets to eliminate cash transactions and levy taxes and surcharges too. So benefits both ways.

Even futuristic they get to determine your road tax based on usage of specific roads and the peak time uages.

[Dry Ice]

Originally Posted by haisaikat

Even futuristic they get to determine your road tax based on usage of specific roads and the peak time uages.

At least that's not gonna happen anytime soon.

Taking a refund from RTOs is a chore, our forum is filled with examples of people struggling for it. I doubt the Govt will willfully implement something which will lower their tax inflow.

[Turbohead]

Originally Posted by FrozeninTime

I Feel these new rules are being enacted to make four wheeler ownership a hassle with ultimate aim to disincentives four wheeler ownership in long run to make public transport more popular and help generate local jobs.

Unlikely move. If it is true, it's a suicidal move too!

1) If public transport is supposed to be the future of all our commutes then there should be long term planning and execution of such plans. Currently, no governement is really bothered about reliable public transport. Buses and metros are already overflowing.

2) A lot of jobs will be lost in the automobile industry. If 1 bus can be made instead of 5 cars, things will quickly go downhill in terms of employment of large number of people. Don't tell me they can all become bus drivers instead.

I believe it's just another way to create more revenue to run our bleeding economy.

[GTO]

Mod Note: Poll added to the thread .

[kiku007]

It amuses me how the Indian Government implements new weird rules to address issues for which other countries have found a viable resolution, DECADES BEFORE.

Let's see how things work in a country like Australia.


What's required to achieve this?

1. Valid details of the Vehicle and it's registered current owner.
2. Cameras with number-plate recognition technology.
3. Information technology systems that process and bill e-tolls.
4. A functional enforcement framework that includes stakeholders from the tollway operator, police, government agencies and judiciary.

The above can replace the archaic physical/manned toll plazas.

Note:

1. It's not just purpose built motorways ways that are tolled abroad. Inner-city by-pass roads, tunnels and even the city-centre may be tolled to recoup the investment or discourage vehicle entry to the city-centre.
2. A tollway should be optional and people should have the option to choose a non-tolled road.
3. A manned physical toll plaza with boom gates and speed breakers is a great example of counter productiveness.
4. If apologists are going to give India's size as the reason for not using technology then I have nothing to say to change that perception.

[Storm2.0]

This is still better than white topped roads that we are getting in Bangalore, something we didn't even ask for. Even if these thugs want to harass us, they should harass us in a less painful manner unlike the situation I mentioned wrt Bangalore above. There's nothing wrong with adding additional sticker ie Fastag among bunch of other stickers already present on our cars.

[nandrive]

Originally Posted by kiku007

It amuses me how the Indian Government implements new weird rules to address issues for which other countries have found a viable resolution, DECADES BEFORE.

Let's see how things work in a country like Australia.
Attachment 2052430

What's required to achieve this?

1. Valid details of the Vehicle and it's registered current owner.
2. Cameras with number-plate recognition technology.
3. Information technology systems that process and bill e-tolls.
4. A functional enforcement framework that includes stakeholders from the tollway operator, police, government agencies and judiciary.

The above can replace the archaic physical/manned toll plazas.

Note:

1. It's not just purpose built motorways ways that are tolled abroad. Inner-city by-pass roads, tunnels and even the city-centre may be tolled to recoup the investment or discourage vehicle entry to the city-centre.
2. A tollway should be optional and people should have the option to choose a non-tolled road.
3. A manned physical toll plaza with boom gates and speed breakers is a great example of counter productiveness.
4. If apologists are going to give India's size as the reason for not using technology then I have nothing to say to change that perception.

You have to pay 40$ deposit(due to covid19 it's waived until year end) and maintain 40$ balance(40+40=80$) at any time and should provide bank details for auto topup. If credit card is used, insane service fee to be paid. How many on the forum are ready to give their bank details for auto topup? If you don't opt for it you have to pay monthly account maintenance fee. Here people are worried about 200₹. So if same rule as Australia is applied in India how many would whole heartedly welcome and follow it? People will start with privacy, poverty, etc.