More deliberations needed for implementing satellite-based tolling: Nitin Gadkari

NEW DELHI: There will be more deliberations on issues of security and privacy considerations, breach, and overall operational control for satellite-based tolling, road transport minister Nitin Gadkari told Rajya Sabha on Wednesday. The govt’s admission for more discussion on these issues indicates that the roll-out of satellite-based tolling on highways will be delayed.

TOI on March 1 had reported that senior govt officials had told a parliamentary panel that the new tolling system will be deployed only after India has its own requisite constellation of navigational satellites with full coverage and after addressing privacy issues.

In a written reply to a Parliament question, the minister said the apex committee and high-level empowered committee consisting of experts from industry and academia, in view of security and privacy considerations, breach and overall operational control, have recommended further deliberations for satellite-based tolling.

He added that a series of meetings have been held by the expert committee, and as per deliberation, it is proposed to proceed with corridor/stretch-based projects for automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) and FASTag system (AFS)-based barrier-less free-flow tolling.

The minister said, “With the existing features of navigation with Indian Constellation (NavIC), the satellite-based tolling requires additional satellite constellations and development of appropriate receivers to achieve the desired level of positional accuracy.”

Ministry officials had told the parliamentary panel that India’s own fully functional satellite navigation system and technology are necessary to protect the privacy of citizens and ensure security of data. They had added that the govt won’t use any foreign navigational system for this purpose.

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