Make in India: Mumbai gets India’s first ‘Home-Made’ aircraft registered to fly

Mumbai, November 21: Due to the efforts of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, Mumbai developed India’s first indigenous aircraft manufactured by Mumbai-based pilot Amol Yadav. The Directorate General of Civil Aviation has registered this six-seater aircraft and has named after Prime Minister Narendra Modi and CM Devendra Fadnavis. 

Yadav, who is currently a Deputy Chief Pilot with Jet Airways, built the aircraft over six years on the terrace of a residential building in Mumbai’s Kandivali suburb. He said that he had been pursuing the DGCA for registration to conduct trials of the aircraft since 2011, but officials were slow to act. It was only after he presented his creation at the 2015 Make in India week that his proposal was pushed.

“It was only because CM Fadnavis intervened and Modi gave directives to the authorities, that we got our aircraft registered,” he said. “This is the first aircraft manufactured in independent India. In gratitude, we have named the aircraft VT-NMD, where NM stands for Narendra Modi and D for Devendra.”

 

Expressing his gratitude, Yadav said PM Modi personally spoke to CM Fadnavis, who in turn wrote a letter to the DGCA seeking registration of the aircraft. Rashmikant, Amol Yadav’s brother, said they have tied up with the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation to construct a 19-seater aircraft. “There are only four countries that manufacture 19-seater aircraft,” he said.