MUMBAI: The National Highways Authority (NHAI) is on course to cross the monetisation targets for this by a wide margin, netting Rs 35,000-40,000 crore this fiscal, as against the budgeted Rs 30,000 crore from bidding out toll-operate-transfer (TOTs) and infrastructure investment trusts (Invits).
Icra Ratings sees the realization from road monetisation crossing the budgeted Rs 30,000 crore this fiscal and touching Rs 35,000-40,000 crore if the assets identified by the highways authority are monetised in a timely manner. This projection is based on the median valuation multiple of 0.62 times seen across the 10 awarded TOT bundles over the past three years, the agency said.
According to Icra, the valuation multiple has varied between 0.46 and 0.93 times across the 10 awarded TOTs over the past three years, with the median multiple being 0.62 times. The average concession period has been 20 years, and the toll collection track record for the underlying assets has varied within 4-15 years with the median being 10 years.
Based on this multiple, monetisation of identified assets, along with TOTs and assets identified in FY26, can potentially garner monetisation proceeds of Rs 35,000-40,000 crore in FY26, taking its total monetisation since inception to around Rs 1.3 trillion.
If realised, this would mark a healthy improvement from the Rs 24,399 crore monetised in FY25. Moreover, this would exceed the budgeted monetisation target of Rs 30,000 crore for the current fiscal, the agency said, addng taking the total to Rs 1.3 trillion since FY19. In fact, the asset monetization has been on a steady growth since it began in FY19 when the authority had raised Rs 9,682 crore, which declined to Rs 5,011 crore in FY21 (no sales in FY20 though), and declined further to Rs 1,011 crore from (TOTs) in FY22 but garnered Rs 7,322 crore from the maiden Invits.
Fiscal 2023 saw, realisation from Invits rising further to Rs 10,662 crore and TOTs falling to Rs Rs 2,850 crore, and come FY24, both these modes hit a high of Rs 15,968 crore from Invits and Rs 15,700 crore from TOTs. While last fiscal saw TOTs plunging to Rs 6,661 crore, Invits continued to rise and touched Rs 17,738 crore. The national highways builder has identified a robust pipeline of projects earmarked for monetisation, which includes the estimated completion of five TOT bundles for which bids have already been initiated.
Moreover, it has earmarked the transfer of project stretches to the Invits established by it. Vinay Kumar G, sector head at the agency, said, the NHAI has predominantly utilised two asset monetisation mechanisms, TOT and Invits since FY19 and since then it has raised Rs 92,633 crore through these channels till FY25 with TOTs generating as much as 53% this. Invits, introduced in FY22, has seen its share expand over the past two years. Since FY23.
During FY23-25, around 7,000 km were announced for monetisation, of which about 2,000 km have been completed to date, and an additional 1,170 km have been offered for sale through five TOTs. Moreover, NHAI has nearly 3,750 km available for sale during this period.
The national monetisation pipeline had set a target of around Rs 53,366 crore with a total monetisable length of 8,894 km for FY25, as against the FY25 budget target of Rs 30,000 crore from road monetisation. Of this, NHAI generated Rs 6,661 crore from 16 TOTs involving 252 km, and Rs 17,738 crore from the 821 km of Invits which was the fourth round of asset transfer to the NHAI Invits amounting to Rs 24,399 crore in proceeds and a cumulative length of 1,073 km in FY25, said Kumar.