Drones may help cops to keep eye on sand mafia

Surat: Drones are being used to carry out search and rescue operations whenever disaster strikes, in several parts of the world. Could the use of drones on May 24 then helped save a few lives of people trapped in a massive fire in Takshashila Arcade? If someone had known how to fly drones, he or she could have definitely found out an area where there was no fire in the building and passed on this information to victims and also authorities concerned, said Haren Gandhi, a former sergeant of Indian Air Force, designated as programme officer of common service centre (CSC), working under Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology
He said this at the conclusion of two-day multi-rotor drone pilot course held under CSC at Holistic Science Research Centre, Kamrej here on Sunday. Sixteen drone flyers and four police personnel from Surat completed the course and learnt about theoretical and practical aspects of the drones by flying seven multi-rotor unmanned aerial vehicles in the skies of the city on Saturday. The course also trained them how to avoid misuse of the drones and the importance of adhering to the guidelines of Directorate General of Civil Aviation.
“This is for the first time that seven drones flew together in the skies of the city for non-commercial purpose. One of them showered flowers on Dada Bhagwan Temple at Kamrej while the others took photographs. Drones can be used to keep an eye on the illegal activities of sand mafia in Surat and also in disaster management. A few people fly drones in Gujarat, but neither they nor police, who give permission for their operation, have technical knowledge about them. It is important to provide complete information from technical to legal about the drones to their flyers, which we did here at the two-day course,” Gandhi said.
Hetal Patel, deputy superintendent of police posted in Surat rural, also attended the course. Flying instructor Kamlesh Suryavanshi gave the participants practical training in flying the drones.