Kerala becomes first state to have drone surveillance in all police districts

Kerala has become the first state in the country to have a drone surveillance system in all police districts in the state. Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan distributed the drones to all police districts and the drone pilot licences to the specially trained drone pilots, at a function held here on Thursday. He also launched indigenously developed anti-drone software on the occasion.

The Chief Minister, in his address, said that Kerala has been at the forefront of modernisation of the police force and that since the use of drones has increased in society, the development of an anti-drone system is also important. He also requested that the trained drone pilots pass on what they have learnt to their colleagues as well. Kerala police had sent 25 police personnel to the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, for specialized training, and another 20 were given basic drone operation training from the drone lab in Kerala.

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IG P Prakash, IPS, who is the nodal officer of the Cyberdome of Kerala Police, said that the drones will be used for law and order purposes and also during disaster management. "Our police drones are used in difficult situations and sometimes in areas that are usually inaccessible. So our personnel has to be specially trained," Prakash told PTI. Initially, all 20 police districts in the state were given one drone each.

Kerala is the first state to develop a drone forensic lab and an anti-drone system at the state level. The drone forensic lab can identify malicious drones and recover full data from them for detailed analysis, the IPS officer noted. Similarly, the anti-drone system could spot any drone in a 5-kilometer radius, immobilise it, and seize it. "This is an indigenously developed anti-drone system, and we are proud of it," Prakash said.