Mobility restrictions to rein in the spread of Covid-19 have triggered a 10% dip in April in month-on-month toll collection by way of Fastag on national highways in, Yes Securities has stated.
Toll collection by way of the electronic Fastag mode was made mandatory from February 15. Around 95% of the total toll collection of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) is by way of Fastag, which has more than 3 crore customers.
According to the brokerage firm, toll collection by way of Fastag in April fell to Rs 2,780 crore as a outcome of a decline of about 15% month-on-month in transactions, which stood at 164 crore throughout the month.
“With lockdowns/ partial lockdowns in several parts of the country, mobility has taken a hit which has impacted toll collections,” Alok Deora, vice president, Yes Securities, stated.
However, he stated user charge collections are anticipated to move back to the development track from July as the Covid-19 influence settles and mobility improves.
Toll collection on the national highways stood at Rs 26,851 crore in 2019-20 as against Rs 24,396 crore a year earlier.
Toll collection took a extreme hit in April last year for the reason that of the nationwide lockdown. Deora stated considering that the restrictions this year have not been as extreme as last April, toll collections have only marginally come down compared to the March collections.
“Over the past few months, toll collections have seen a sharp rise with improvement in economic activities and government’s push towards electronic toll collections,” he stated.
A continuous decline in the figure could possibly hit NHAI’s operational asset monetisation programme, vital for the authority to pare debt that stood at about Rs 3 lakh crore, at the finish of 2020-21, and to create highways.
As per the 2021-22 Budget documents, NHAI could raise Rs 10,000 crore by way of monetisation of operational highway projects in the existing fiscal. NHAI has currently submitted needed documents with market place regulator SEBI to raise at least Rs 5,one hundred crore by way of its initial InvIT. In addition, a couple of tranches of toll-operate-transfer model will also be attempted out. Fund raising by way of securitisation of toll will also be carried out in the existing fiscal.