Indian Aviation Booms, Reaches 94% Pre-Covid Levels

Hyderabad: Mr Vumlunmang Vualnam, Secretary of Civil Aviation, Govt of India yesterday while addressing the panel discussion on ‘Travel & Tourism—Positioning India as a Prime Destination and Market: Charting the Future of Travel and Tourism’ said that Indian travel and tourism sector is witnessing tremendous growth. “Indian landscape has everything for tourists,” he added.

Participating in the panel, on day two of ‘WINGS INDIA 2024’, organised by the Ministry of Civil Aviation and FICCI, Mr Aalap Bansal, Partner, KPMG said India is shining star and Indian tourism has recovered up to 94 per cent to the pre-Covid level.

Mr Carlos Menéndez, International Cooperation Officer and South Asia Regional Manager, EASA stressed upon ensuring safer and greener skies.

While addressing the session on 'Flight to the Future: Drone Revolutionizing the Aviation Landscape’, Mr Rajiv Bansal, Former Secretary, of the Ministry of Civil Aviation, Govt of India and CEO, of NISG (National Institute of Smart Government) said that systematic intervention is the need of the hour in the Drone space.

Mr Bansal said that the drone sector is the most happening space. “A lot of drone pilots are being trained now. Several hundreds and thousands of Drone Pilot licenses have been issued,” he added. Speaking on the role of women pilots he stated that currently there are 18 per cent women drone pilots out of the 1600 licenses issued last year. Since we set a global benchmark in civil aviation, the same can be repeated in drones in terms of several drone women pilots, he noted.

Mr SC Sharma, Joint Director of the Quality Council of India emphasized quality control and added that the cost of attaining good quality products is much lesser than a poor-quality product. Quality and safety play a very important role, he noted.

Mr Tan Kah Han, Chief Technology Officer and Senior Director for Unmanned Systems Group, Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) said that Hyderabad's population is 60 per cent of Singapore's. “We are a small country and Singapore needs drones to improve the way we work, live and teach. Drone is no longer a toy, it is much more,” he added.

Mr Anshu Abhishek, COO & Co-founder, Techeagle spoke on the Drone Delivery of Medicine.

Mr Deepak Bharadwaj, Director & Co-founder, of ToTechWorld Aviation spoke about connecting technology with farmers and their pioneering work in the manufacture of Agri drones and elevating their earning capacity of farmers by way of better spray capacity.

Wing Commander (Retd), Ajit Mate, Lead System Engineer, at Boeing Air Traffic Management, spoke about payload carrying capacity which is currently at about 50 kgs and is likely to increase as we go along.

In another panel on ‘Women in Aviation - fostering gender-neutral opportunities in aviation’, Mr Vikram Dev Dutt, DG, DGCSA said greater women's participation in aviation is a game changer and force multiplier. The number of women pilots is increasing in India however, women in meaningful senior leadership are still a challenge. He along with Ms Rubina Ali, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Civil Aviation, Govt of India moderated the panel discussion. She further added that once male-dominated bastions of civil aviation now have women pilots, aeronautical engineers and women in many other positions that she never dreamt of.

The session aimed to facilitate discussions, share inspiring narratives and develop strategies that will create a more inclusive aviation industry.

Ms Anju Madeka, CEO, of Durgapur Airport, said that she had to prove to stay competitive in the industry. The future in aviation is women, she added. Mr Philip Cumming, Deputy Minister Counsellor, the Embassy of the United States of America said India has set a benchmark in women pilots while the world average was 8 per cent.

Day two of the Wings India 2024 saw many panel discussions on different subjects--Skill Development, Startups & FTOs, MRO, Travel and Tourism, Aircraft Leasing etc. of greater importance to the aviation industry.