Contractors Will Pay For Highway Mishaps, MoRTH To Enforce Up To Rs 50 Lakh Penalties - 'Brake The Habit'

With the exponential growth in our National Highways, India's road accident rate has also been on a disturbing rise. According to the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) data, the country's

national highway network has grown by 60 percent in the last decade. While establishing the second-largest road network in the world is cause for celebration, we often come across instances of road accidents leading to injury or loss of life. Several factors can lead to mishaps on national highways but if it turns out to be due to a construction flaw, then the government will now hold the contractor accountable and they would be liable to pay hefty fines. Here are the details.

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In a bid to prevent construction-related road accidents and loss of life, MoRTH has recently announced that it will penalise contractors if more than one accident occurs on a particular stretch of a National Highway within one year. The decision was confirmed by V Umashankar, Road Transport And Highways Secretary, according to a PTI report.

Under the new mandate, National Highways built under the government's build-operate-transfer (BOT) model are under the scanner. Contractors will now have to undertake crash management under the revised BOT document. This means the contractor will be responsible for taking corrective steps if more than one accident happens under the highway stretch built by them. 'If more than one accident happens in a particular stretch, say 500 meters, then the contractor will face a penalty of Rs 25 lakh. Penalty will increase to Rs 50 lakh if an accident happens next year," Umashankar said. He further clarified that the highways ministry has already identified 3,500 accident-prone spots across the National Highways network in the country.

Cashless Treatment Scheme:

In addition to the BOT revision, the Road Transport And Highways Secretary also confirmed that the government will soon launch a cashless treatment scheme for road accident victims. Under the scheme, victims will be entitled to cashless treatment of up to Rs 1.50 lakh for the first seven days after any mishap on National Highways. MoRTH had announced the scheme earlier in May 2025, in a bid to reduce the number of road accident-related fatalities.

Times Now, India’s leading English News channel, through its automotive vertical Times Drive, launched a nationwide road safety initiative, ‘Brake The Habit’ on India’s 79th Independence Day. Across metro cities, bold campaign messaging transformed bus shelters and billboards into wake-up calls against overspeeding, reckless overtakes, and distracted driving. This initiative was officially flagged off by Shri Nitin Gadkari, Hon’ble Minister for Road Transport and Highways, who unveiled the initiative and lauded Times Network for leveraging its stature to amplify the importance of road safety and champion a cause of national significance.