National Highway Toll Collection Growth Seen At 10-12% In FY28: ICRA

Toll collections on India's national highways are expected to grow 10-12 percent in FY28, according to a fresh report from credit ratings agency ICRA. The forecast points to higher toll rate revisions and steady traffic growth of around 4-5 percent as the main drivers behind that pickup, coming right after a noticeably slower stretch expected in the current financial year.

What ICRA Is Actually Forecasting

ICRA's report lays out a fairly clear path for the next couple of years. Toll collection growth is expected to moderate to 7-9 percent in FY27, down from around 10 percent the year before, mainly on the back of slower traffic growth and smaller toll rate hikes. National highway traffic itself is projected to grow 4.5-5.5 percent in FY27, a step down from the 6 percent growth seen in FY26, while toll rate increases for the year are estimated at just 3.4-4 percent, partly held back by export-related traffic challenges.

Looking further out to FY28, though, ICRA expects a stronger rebound. The 10-12 percent growth forecast for that year rests on more favourable toll rate revisions, supported by an expected pickup in Wholesale Price Index inflation, alongside continued steady traffic growth. ICRA projects WPI growth of 8-8.5 percent by December 2026 and 4.5-5.5 percent by March 2027, both of which feed directly into how much toll rates can realistically be revised upward.

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Why FY27 Is Shaping Up To Be A Slower Year

Suprio Banerjee, Co-Group Head of Corporate Ratings at ICRA, explained that highway traffic growth largely tracks the gross value added, or GVA, of the construction, mining and manufacturing sectors. That sector grew a strong 8.1 percent in FY26, which directly supported 6 percent traffic growth on national highways and a healthy 10 percent rise in toll collections that year. The slowdown expected in FY27 essentially reflects softer momentum in these same underlying sectors, rather than any sudden drop-off in vehicle movement.

Road construction itself has also been running slower. ICRA expects the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways to complete 9,000-9,500 km of road execution in FY27, roughly in line with the 9,380 km completed in FY26, as project awards remain sluggish. A slower pace of new highway construction doesn't reduce toll collection on existing roads directly, but it does shape how much additional tolled network gets added to the system over the next couple of years.

What's Really Driving Highway Traffic Growth

It's worth understanding why economic activity in construction, mining and manufacturing matters so much for highway toll numbers. These sectors move enormous volumes of raw material, equipment and finished goods by road and commercial vehicles typically account for a large share of total traffic on India's national highways. When factory output, mining activity and construction work pick up, that translates fairly directly into more trucks on the road carrying that freight, which shows up in toll booth numbers within a matter of months.

That's also why ICRA's forecast leans so heavily on WPI trends and sector-level GVA data rather than just guessing at traffic volumes directly. Toll rates on most highway projects are linked to WPI, so inflation trends end up shaping toll revenue almost as much as the actual number of vehicles passing through.

What This Means For Trucks, Buses And Fleet Operators

For anyone running a fleet of trucks, buses, mini trucks or pickups, toll collection trends are a useful, if indirect, way to gauge how busy India's road freight and passenger transport sector actually is. Rising toll collections generally point to more goods and people moving by road, which tends to be a positive signal for demand across the commercial vehicle industry as a whole. A slower FY27 followed by a stronger FY28 suggests the broader freight and logistics environment may see a similar dip-then-recover pattern over the next two years.

It's also a reminder that toll costs themselves are set to keep climbing gradually, given the WPI-linked rate revisions built into most highway contracts. For fleet operators running long-haul routes with buses and heavy trucks, factoring in steadily rising toll expenses over the next couple of years is a sensible part of route and cost planning, rather than assuming toll rates will stay flat.

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Frequently Asked Questions on Commercial Vehicles

Q1. How much will national highway toll collections grow in FY28?

Ans. ICRA expects national highway toll collections in India to grow 10-12% in FY28, driven by higher toll rate revisions and steady traffic growth of 4-5%.

Q2. Why is toll collection growth slower in FY27?

Ans. Toll collection growth is expected to moderate to 7-9% in FY27, down from around 10% the previous year, mainly due to slower traffic growth of 4.5-5.5% and lower toll rate revisions of around 3.4-4%.

Q3. What drives traffic growth on India's national highways?

Ans. According to ICRA, highway traffic growth largely tracks the gross value added (GVA) of the construction, mining and manufacturing sectors, which grew 8.1% in FY26 and supported 6% traffic growth and 10% toll collection growth that year.

Q4. What does toll growth mean for trucks and buses on the road?

Ans. Since commercial vehicles account for a large share of highway traffic, steady or rising toll collection growth generally reflects healthy freight and passenger movement by trucks, buses, mini trucks and pickups across the country.