NHAI fines Riddhi Siddhi Associates Rs 15 lakh over Bijwasan toll plaza altercation

The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has barred M/s Riddhi Siddhi Associates, the agency that collects user fees at the Bijwasan Fee Plaza on NH-248BB, from taking part in any ongoing or future NHAI tenders for one month and fined it Rs 15 lakh, after its staff were involved in a physical altercation with commuters on Thursday, 5 November 2026. In a statement this week, NHAI said it has also issued a show-cause notice proposing a one-year ban on the agency and its owners and directors, recommended immediate suspension of its contract, and directed it to hand the plaza to a new agency on 14 November 2026.

India's national highway toll plazas are run by private agencies hired by NHAI through tenders. The agency's staff are the people a driver actually deals with, but the contract makes the agency answerable to NHAI for how they behave. NHAI pointed to exactly that clause: under the contract agreement, the user fee collection agency is responsible for the conduct, discipline and behaviour of the personnel it deploys at the fee plaza. The authority called the 5 November incident "a gross failure on the part of the agency to ensure discipline, proper supervision and adherence to contractual obligations".

What changes is not only the fine. A debarment shuts a company out of NHAI's tenders, which for a toll operator means losing access to its main source of business. The one-month ban is already in force; the proposed one-year ban, which would also cover the owners and directors personally, is still at the show-cause stage, meaning the agency can reply before NHAI decides. The contract suspension is likewise a recommendation, not yet a final order. Readers should treat both as pending.

The action is part of a pattern. NHAI has punished toll agencies over staff behaviour before: in May 2024 it removed an agency at the Sirmandi Toll Plaza in Rajasthan from its list of pre-qualified bidders for three months after finding its reply to a show-cause notice unsatisfactory, and in August 2025 it fined the operator of the Bhuni plaza near Meerut Rs 20 lakh after an assault on a soldier. Each case has made the same point: misconduct by toll staff is treated as the contractor's failure, with money and future business at stake.

For daily users of the Dwarka Expressway, the practical change is that a different agency will run the Bijwasan plaza from 14 November. The fee rules themselves are not affected by this action.

Peepals calculation: The Rs 15 lakh fine in the Bijwasan case is 25% lower than the Rs 20 lakh fine in the 2025 Bhuni case ((20 − 15) ÷ 20 = 0.25). The proposed one-year ban would be 12 times as long as the one-month ban now in force (12 months ÷ 1 month), and four times the three-month debarment in the 2024 Sirmandi case (12 ÷ 3). Our calculation from the reported figures.

Short-term: Riddhi Siddhi Associates cannot bid for NHAI work for a month and must pay Rs 15 lakh; a new agency takes over the Bijwasan plaza on 14 November.

Long-term: If NHAI confirms the one-year ban on the agency and its directors, it would mark a tougher line that reaches the people who run toll firms, not only the companies.

Who is affected: Commuters on the Dwarka Expressway and NH-248BB; Riddhi Siddhi Associates, its staff and owners; and other toll collection agencies, which now face a clear example of what staff misconduct can cost.

What to watch next: The handover of the Bijwasan Fee Plaza to a new agency on 14 November 2026, and NHAI's decision on the proposed one-year debarment once the agency replies to the show-cause notice.

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