Drone Destination to establish 150 drone pilot training schools by 2025: CEO

Delhi-based company Drone Destination plans to establish at least 150 drone pilot training schools across the country by 2025, its CEO Chirag Sharma has said.

"We intend to partner with universities, agricultural institutes and police academies to serve the distinct needs of the ecosystem and enable employment and entrepreneurship opportunities to over 1 lakh individuals required by our industry by 2025," Sharma said in an interview to PTI.

Drone Destination is India's first remote pilot training organisation approved by aviation regulator Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) under the new Drone Rules, 2021. It currently runs six remote pilot training schools in the country.

"The company has so far opened six centres: four in association with Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Uran Akademi (IGRUA), the largest flying training organisation under the Ministry of Civil Aviation at Gurugram, Bengaluru, Gwalior and Dharamshala; one in association with Sanskardham Global Mission Institute; and the most recent launch at Punjab's first Drone Training School in Chandigarh University," Sharma noted.

The company is adding two more schools to its network in association with Hindusthan College of Engineering in Coimbatore and with Vaigai College of Engineering in Madurai, he said.

While inaugurating the two-day-long Drone Festival of India on Friday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had said it is his dream that everyone in India has a smartphone, every farm has a drone and every house prospers.

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"Promotion of drone technology is another medium of advancing our commitment to good governance and ease of living. In the form of drones, we have a smart tool that is going to be part and parcel of people's lives,'' Modi had said.

"The company has trained 500 pilots over the past few months. We intend to train about 1,500-2,000 pilots from the Gurugram centre in the coming year, and 500 pilots each from other locations," Sharma told PTI.

He said Drone Destination plans to open a large network of "150-plus drone hubs by 2025 offering drone training, rent a drone, and drone services from each hub".

Drone Destination, in association with IGRUA, has also conducted several Train-the-Trainer courses, and has developed more than 150 DGCA-approved drone instructors in the country, he mentioned.