India emerging as drone hub of the world

Drones or Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) are helping change the flying landscape in India. Delivering Covid vaccines in Telangana starting this month, helping corporations like the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) carry out research and inspection activities at some of its plants and spraying pesticides are mong the various activities that drones are being used for.

They were also used for controlling locust swarms which affected Rajasthan, Punjab, and Madhya Pradesh in May last year. In October last year, Delhi Police used drones for effective surveillance of containment zones to combat the coronavirus threat. Drones carried both day and night surveillance and successfully collected data in the form of images and videos and helped policemen monitor the situation from a safe distance.

According to Wing Commander S Vijay (Veteran), Chief Operating Officer, Skye AirMobility, the commercial use of drones was legalised in India in 2018. He adds that India is one of the fastest-growing drone markets in the world. As per FICCI’s estimates, India’s drone and counter-drone market potential will reach Rs 3,00,000 crore (approximately $40 billion) by 2030.

Skye AirMobility is a drone delivery tech company based in Bengaluru and the national capital, which is working to integrate drone-based deliveries into healthcare, relief, food, ecommerce, urban, and defence logistics.

Amber Dubey, Joint Secretary in the Ministry of Civil Aviation and head of the Drones Division says, “India has the potential to be the drone hub of the world given the huge requirements of drones in infrastructure, mining, agriculture, healthcare, national security, law enforcement, media, and entertainment to name a few.”

For instance, NTPC is using drones to carry out terrain mapping, stockpile volumetric analysis, aerial inspections, and other applications at the three NTPC sites. This is expected to provide NTPC data with high accuracy at a fraction of the cost.

A government official adds that for important projects like SVAMITVA, BVLOS (Beyond Visual Line of Sight) operations, infrastructure, mining, and agriculture drone operations are being facilitated through the conditional exemption route allowed under Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Rules, 2021.

SVAMITVA are rural property cards through which villagers get their properties mapped by drones, geo-tagged, and can download them on their phones. Hundreds of drones are said to be in operation for this project.

However, drones making a bigger mark in the Indian landscape is still a work in progress. According to Dubey, the UAS Rules, 2021 were notified in March 2021 and the online Digital Sky Platform is now being aligned to the new Rules and should be up by October 2 this year.

Commander Vijay adds, “Due to safety concerns Visual Line of Sight (VLOS) operations were only permitted. Because of this, limited exploitation of drones happened since 2018 mainly in the survey, mapping and precision agriculture sectors.”

However, given that it is a new technology and though there are immense benefits that it can provide, there are some pitfalls that need to be crossed still.

Commander Vijay points out that most of the electronic components used in manufacturing the drones and sensors (payloads) are imported. “Due to high customs duties on these components, the overall production cost of the drone increases by 30% to 40%. This makes the drone solution less preferred in few sectors over traditional methods,” he says.

Given that drones have only recently become popular in India, there are other wrinkles that need to be ironed out as well. In December last year, the government issued a draft paper on air traffic management of drones and their interplay with commercial airline traffic.

Clarity on this is needed as drones will fly alongside manned aircraft for which a high level of security needs to be maintained. The paper sought public consultations on how flight planning capabilities and providing real-time flight authorisation and situational awareness apart from providing weather and terrain data can be provided.

(The writer is a Delhi-based senior journalist)