[Rahul Lal]

Import of drones in India is Prohibited. Members are advised not to bring with them. Custom officers posted at Ports are sensitised regarding import such prohibited items, so you not be lucky every time.😂
Pl see latest DGFT notification.

[josephilip]

After reading this thread it seems that it is pretty safe to carry the drone as if we were using that thing for a while, like ditching the packaging and stuff like that. But according to DGCA i am pretty sure that any drones over 250gms needs to have Unique Identification Number and Type approval from DGCA. Those are impossible to get for dji drones fron the limited knowledge I have. We might be able to get away with a less than 250gm drone provided that we will be flying it below 50ft.

[Rahul Lal]

Pl see the revised policy & not the existing policy. In revised policy of DGFT all types of drones are Prohibited.

[sidbarabari]

I am new member here and I will keep this simple. I run a startup which manufacture drones. People can actually buy drones once they are registered by the company through DGCA. Drones manufactured in India aren't that bad. They are a little basic but they do come with warranty and spare support along with better options for control.

[Samfromindia]

Originally Posted by Rahul Lal

Import of drones in India is Prohibited. Members are advised not to bring with them. Custom officers posted at Ports are sensitised regarding import such prohibited items, so you not be lucky every time.😂
Pl see latest DGFT notification.

There is a difference between import for reselling and buying for personal use. Show me a single report / video where a travelers drone is confiscated by customs. Meanwhile I can show you 100s of videos where people have successfully carried drone from international flights. When you are coming as an individual traveler with a unboxed drone, there is no way they can prove its bought outside vs you taking it from India for travel and coming back. Meanwhile there is a big business going on where most camera shops are selling drones from grey market. So no need to be paranoid about customs.

Originally Posted by josephilip

After reading this thread it seems that it is pretty safe to carry the drone as if we were using that thing for a while, like ditching the packaging and stuff like that. But according to DGCA i am pretty sure that any drones over 250gms needs to have Unique Identification Number and Type approval from DGCA. Those are impossible to get for dji drones fron the limited knowledge I have. We might be able to get away with a less than 250gm drone provided that we will be flying it below 50ft.

This was a temporary issue where Digital Sky platform was not registering new drone. However its opened again and although optional, I was successfully able to register my nano drone by paying only 100.

About altitude limit, the 15M lock is there for Mavic Mini 2, however its pretty easy to unlock that and raise it to 500M or even more. Lots of YouTube videos and tutorials on how to unlock altitude limit.

[Rahul Lal]

I have just informed the legal provision for import of drones applicable at present. Prohibition does not differentiate between import for reselling or bringing for personal use. You can google & check if it is allowed for import or not. Thousands of confiscated drones are lying with customs.
As far as 'there is no way they can be prove whether it is brought from outside or you are taking back to India’ pl be informed that any item which a passenger is carrying with him at the time of leaving India & intends to bring it back, then he has to inform customs at the time of departure and obtain a export certificate (which mentions all the details of the item including its s.no. etc) So on arrival if you insist that that Drone was originally carried from India & you are taking it back then Customs will ask for this export certificate.

[Samfromindia]

Originally Posted by sidbarabari

I am new member here and I will keep this simple. I run a startup which manufacture drones. People can actually buy drones once they are registered by the company through DGCA. Drones manufactured in India aren't that bad. They are a little basic but they do come with warranty and spare support along with better options for control.

Would love to know more about Indian made drones especially in the entry level & hobbyist segment. Care to throw some light.

Originally Posted by Rahul Lal

I have just informed the legal provision for import of drones applicable at present. Prohibition does not differentiate between import for reselling or bringing for personal use. You can google & check if it is allowed for import or not. Thousands of confiscated drones are lying with customs.
As far as 'there is no way they can be prove whether it is brought from outside or you are taking back to India’ pl be informed that any item which a passenger is carrying with him at the time of leaving India & intends to bring it back, then he has to inform customs at the time of departure and obtain a export certificate (which mentions all the details of the item including its s.no. etc) So on arrival if you insist that that Drone was originally carried from India & you are taking it back then Customs will ask for this export certificate.

This is correct and applicable for any items above exemption limit, not just drones. Say you are carrying 4 phones or expensive camera equipment (Above 50K limit), you are supposed to do this. But in reality let me tell you no one does that or get caught unless you are overdoing it.

At the end of the day its upto you to be a law abiding citizen or not. So far I haven't met any person who freely declares shopping over 50K and pay customs. Well I am glad you will be one of them As for the rest of us, we will continue importing our drones and flying them over 15M

[sidbarabari]

Originally Posted by Samfromindia

Would love to know more about Indian made drones especially in the entry level & hobbyist segment. Care to throw some light.

Ofcourse. Anytime. How can I help? The hobby segment include videography and Racing drones both of which are quadcopters.

[MT_Hyderabad]

Two of my friends were carrying one drone each in their baggage.
One got cleared without problem, the other had to break the drone and deposit the carcass with customs. Drones are not allowed for personal or commercial usage without prior approval/licenses.

[Samfromindia]

Originally Posted by MT_Hyderabad

Two of my friends were carrying one drone each in their baggage.
One got cleared without problem, the other had to break the drone and deposit the carcass with customs. Drones are not allowed for personal or commercial usage without prior approval/licenses.

Woah that's bad. Can you tell the drone model which was seized. Didn't he have a Digital Sky registration ? Also was it a domestic or international flight. Did he happen to carry the drone with battery ? So far none of my friends faced any legal issue carrying drones in domestic / international flights. Maybe we can get some first hand experiences from multiple drone users in the forum.

Originally Posted by sidbarabari

Ofcourse. Anytime. How can I help? The hobby segment include videography and Racing drones both of which are quadcopters.

Considering majority of buyers here go for nano drone, what does the made in India market offer in this segment. Can you please provide link and price and compare them with the DJI mini series ? I am assuming repair cost will be much cheaper unlike DJI which is very expensive to repair in India.

Also is there any FPV option available with GoPro mount. Like the one here:

https://youtu.be/ykobqFvag28

[MT_Hyderabad]

Originally Posted by Samfromindia

Woah that's bad. Can you tell the drone model which was seized. Didn't he have a Digital Sky registration ? Also was it a domestic or international flight. Did he happen to carry the drone with battery ? So far none of my friends faced any legal issue carrying drones in domestic / international flights.

They were travelling from Zurich to Hyderabad. They bought drones from Dubai airport IIRC.
Will try to get some details from them.

[sidbarabari]

Originally Posted by Samfromindia

Considering majority of buyers here go for nano drone, what does the made in India market offer in this segment. Can you please provide link and price and compare them with the DJI mini series ? I am assuming repair cost will be much cheaper unlike DJI which is very expensive to repair in India.

I understand. We get calls atleast twice a week about DJI phantom spare parts; most of them because of problems with the broken camera mount. DJi drones have always been banned in India and they aren't interested in working with Indian government to register their systems to make them legal.

For a fuss free system, DJi is the one to go at this point but again, if you are good at flying and you won't need autonomous flights, I would suggest to look into racing drones which are bare framed systems (around 10k just for the system. Without transmitter) These can be included with a go pro camera, fpv goggles and a transmitter.

In my experience, a small fpv camera will have a comparatively good video quality with respect to price if one is on budget. As most of us are looking at landscapes from a height of 50-80 feet

[ninjatalli]

Originally Posted by sidbarabari

Ofcourse. Anytime. How can I help? The hobby segment include videography and Racing drones both of which are quadcopters.

+1 to sam's points.

It would also help do a comparo with a popular international drone model (e.g. the Mini 1/2 or something appropriate with regards to the model you produce).

[Nitish.arnold]

all of the major points have been covered, so not reiterating those.

Just sharing a personal example:

Was looking to buy DJI mini2 after selling my DJI spark,
Asked my friend who was flying down from Dubai to buy one.

Here in India (Delhi NCR) the non-fly more combo (since I am a hobbyist & not a pro, hence extra batteries etc not really needed) was costing 50k+ INR,
whereas the cost came to be 34k buying from the Dubai mall without any discounts, I am sure buying from the "local market" of Dubai would have been slightly cheaper but did not want to bug my friend too much over loose change.

Asked him to throw away the box & carry the drone in the cabin luggage & controller in the check-in luggage, as suggested by some "so-called" experts.

He came without any hassles/checks anywhere & the drone received was without any damage too.

Now, I am getting the mini 3 pro, after maxing out the learning & fun capability of the Mini 2.

The same friend has been pinged again

P.S. If someone is looking to unlock height restrictions in their DJI drones in India, they can drop a msg. I will be more than happy to assist in the same.

P.P.S. If you want to check out my work with DJI, a few reels are uploaded on my Instagram account, go have a look.

[Samfromindia]

Originally Posted by MT_Hyderabad

They were travelling from Zurich to Hyderabad. They bought drones from Dubai airport IIRC.
Will try to get some details from them.

From Dubai Airport duty free ? In that case I am not sure how your second friend made it through. For those who don't know, Dubai duty free is huge and bigger than some malls. You enter this place once you submit your check in luggage and pass the security clearance. At that time you only have cabin luggage with you and wait to board your flight. Anything you buy then goes inside your cabin luggage. Once you land in India, these cabin luggage needs to pass security clearance again and after that you collect your check-in luggage and pass the customs green / red channel.

Another important info I will like to share is the fiasco which many Indian travelers did on way back to India in my last flight. They went on a shopping spree in Dubai duty free. Just minutes before boarding the flight, they airport staff made them weigh their cabin baggage. Anything that was over 7KG needed to be thrown away ! Yes you read that right, many things which they bought minutes back were thrown away, and they had dedicated counters for that. Like check-in luggage, you cannot pay extra baggage for cabin luggage and carry them along with you ! One girl sitting behind me was crying all the way in flight after losing a lot of money back there.

Originally Posted by sidbarabari

For a fuss free system, DJi is the one to go at this point but again, if you are good at flying and you won't need autonomous flights, I would suggest to look into racing drones which are bare framed systems (around 10k just for the system. Without transmitter) These can be included with a go pro camera, fpv goggles and a transmitter.

In my experience, a small fpv camera will have a comparatively good video quality with respect to price if one is on budget. As most of us are looking at landscapes from a height of 50-80 feet

That's good info. I have seen some bloggers custom building their own drones. Do you have any link where to buy relevant parts and get info ?

Originally Posted by Nitish.arnold

Was looking to buy DJI mini2 after selling my DJI spark,
Asked my friend who was flying down from Dubai to buy one.

Drone prices in DXB retail stores like Virgin/SharafDG/Jumbo are more or less the same across all malls. Another thing I noticed is that these places tend to keep only the latest models and remove the old gen ones. Just weeks after Hero11 was released, I couldn't find Hero10 in most places in Mall Of Emirates or Dubai Mall.

Mini3 pro is a great drone, was considering it before deciding to save some cash You can also consider Avata for a bit more to get in FPV action. If your friend is a Dubai resident, he can save around 5-10% more by shopping in Individual stores like the ones in Meena Bazar and paying in cash.

Coming to altitude limit hack, which ones are you using ?

Drone-Hacks
Rainbow
Litchi

Are you having cracked version of any of these hacks ? There is a way to use the free version of rainbow & litchi unlimited times, but I never came across bypassing the 36 Euro which drone hacks charges.