Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) and Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) have granted conditional exemption from Drone Rules, 2021 to the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) for conducting experimental Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) vaccine delivery in Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Manipur, and Nagaland up to a height of 3000 meters using drones.

This exemption shall be subject to the terms and conditions of the said airspace clearance and shall be valid for one year from the date of approval of the said airspace clearance or until further orders, whichever is earlier.

Earlier, on September 11, 2021, the Union Minister for Civil Aviation Jyotiraditya Scindia had launched the first of its kind ‘Medicines from the Sky’ project at Vikarabad in Telangana state under which drugs and vaccines will be delivered using drones.

Speaking on the occasion Scindia had said that the Medicines from the Sky (MTS) project under which drugs and vaccines are delivered using drones, will be taken up on a pilot basis in 16 green zones in Telangana and scaled up to the national level based on data.

Under the liberalised Drone Rules 2021, approved in August this year, permissions are needed in Yellow Zones while Red Zones are no-fly areas. In Green Zones no such permission is required. The Telangana government will expand the MTS project to 16 Green Zones and the data will be analysed for three months. 

On 25^th August 2021, the Ministry of Civil Aviation notified the liberalised Drone Rules, 2021 to usher in an era of super-normal growth while balancing safety and security considerations in drone operations.