Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) - Role, Functions, and Recent Approvals

The Role of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation in UPSC

The DGCA operates as an extension of the Ministry of Civil Aviation, under the Government of India.

• The DGCA is the primary regulatory body in the field of Civil Aviation in India, focusing primarily on safety concerns.
• The DGCA is in charge of regulating air transport services to, from, and within India.
• The regulatory body also oversees the enforcement of civil air regulations, air safety, and airworthiness standards.
• It also coordinates regulatory functions with the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO), a United Nations (UN) specialised agency established in 1944 to lay the groundwork for standards and procedures for peaceful global air navigation. India is one of its 193 members, and it is headquartered in Montreal, Canada.
• The DGCA has its headquarters in New Delhi and regional offices in various parts of India.
• The Director General of Civil Aviation heads the DGCA.

Recent Approval by the DGCA

The DGCA recently gave a significant approval.

• Drone manufacturer ‘Garuda Aerospace’ became the first drone startup in India to receive double certification from the DGCA for their indigenously designed Kisan Drones.
• The Made in India ‘Kisan’ drones are specifically designed for agricultural purposes. They help reduce crop loss, monitor crop health, measure yield, and mitigate crop loss with state-of-the-art manufacturing capabilities.

Learn more about Kisan Drones here .

Functions of the DGCA

The key functions of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation are depicted in the image below:

Image source – www.dgca.gov.in

e-GCA (e-governance in DGCA)

The e-governance platform in DGCA was launched in November 2021.

• The eGCA initiative marks a significant milestone in the DGCA's digital transformation journey and a step towards 'ease of doing business'.
• This single-window platform aims to bring about a monumental change by eliminating operational inefficiencies, minimising personal interaction, enhancing transparency, increasing productivity, and improving regulatory reporting.
• e-GCA provides a robust IT infrastructure and service delivery framework. The e-platform offers an end-to-end solution, including various software applications, connectivity with all the regional offices, a 'portal' for information dissemination and for providing online and speedy service delivery in a secure environment.
• The project has been implemented with TCS as the Service Provider and PWC as the Project Management Consultant.
• A new process for auto-filling a pilot’s e-logbook by integrating Aircraft System data of scheduled airline operators with eGCA was started in 2022. This method will help in the timely submission of applications by pilots for issue, renewal, and endorsement of licences by removing multi-layer data-validation steps. IndiGo has already implemented this method, and other scheduled airlines are also expected to implement the same.

Aviation Safety Ranking

In 2022, the DGCA made a significant leap in the International Civil Aviation Organisation’s coordinated validation mission (or audit) that was conducted in November 2022. As a result, India's effective implementation score has risen from the previous 69.95% to nearly 85.49%, thereby changing India’s Safety Oversight rank from 102 to 48, among the 193 contracting states.

More information on the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) can be found here