Highways Ministry to Fix Toll Rates and Plaza Locations Before Roads Are Even Built

India's road transport and highways ministry is rewriting the rulebook on how tolls are set for national highway projects. Until now, toll plazas were often built first, with their exact location and fee structure sorted out later. This sometimes led to plazas being constructed in spots that broke official distance rules, forcing awkward and expensive corrections after the fact.

To fix this, the ministry has ordered that any request to bend the standard toll placement rules must now go through a newly formed toll committee before construction even begins. This means location and rate decisions will be locked in early, rather than being discovered as problems once the road is already built.

This move builds on a detailed procedure the ministry issued in December 2025, meant to sync toll announcements with how far along a project actually is. Agencies building highways must start the toll approval paperwork either six months before a project finishes, or once construction is 80 percent done, whichever comes first. By the time a project is 95 percent complete, the toll fee notice must be fully approved and officially published.

The rules also push agencies to seek exemptions from standard toll placement norms as early as possible, ideally within six months of a project being awarded. For projects planned to be sold or transferred to private operators or investment funds after completion, similar approvals must be secured before bidding even opens.

Rather than simply granting more exceptions, the ministry wants agencies to first try alternatives, such as adjusting the stretch of road that one toll plaza covers, or using digital tolling technology to merge or streamline plazas. A new dashboard is also planned to track whether agencies are meeting these deadlines.

Industry voices have welcomed the change. Experts note that fixing problems after a plaza is already built is far more time consuming and costly than catching them beforehand. By moving the checks earlier, the government hopes to give developers and lenders more certainty, cut down on delays, and reduce fights over where toll plazas should sit.

The existing rule that toll plazas normally cannot be placed within 60 kilometres of another plaza or within 10 kilometres of a town's municipal boundary remains in place. Special permission is still allowed, but now that permission must be sorted out well before any construction work starts.

The ministry has not yet publicly detailed how the new toll committee will function day to day, and it did not respond to requests for further comment. Major toll road developers, including large private players, have also stayed silent on the change so far.