The staffers at a toll plaza here today ran away, leaving the booth unattended for hours after a BJP legislator confronted them for allegedly collecting toll illegally.
However, the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) said the agency was authorised to collect toll.
During the time the staffers deserted the booth at Dasna on National Highway 24 in Ghaziabad district, several vehicles passed through it without paying toll.
The MLA, Dalbeer Singh, said there was a long queue at the toll booth when he reached there in the afternoon and he asked the staffers for the reason for the delay.
He told the staffers that he was told that they were "not entitled to collect toll as your term had expired long ago and the toll being collected by you is not legal".
"After they got to know my credentials, they fled, which created more suspicion in my mind. I talked to District Magistrate Ritu Maheshwari and told her about the incident and urged her to investigate the matter," he said.
Maheshwari said an inquiry would be conducted by the additional district magistrate and if the staffers were found to be collecting toll illegally, action would be taken against them.
The deputy general manager of the NHAI, Mudit Garg, however, submitted documents to the district authorities, which purportedly confirmed that the collecting agency was given a legal contract to collect toll last year and that the contract was renewed this year.
The NHAI, in its letter to the district magistrate and the senior superintendent of police, has requested them to provide legal assistance to the toll collecting agency.
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