Subhash Shihora bought the first flying car in India for a steal – two crore rupees in 2009. But by the time he was done with duties and taxes, the price had escalated to almsot five crore rupees before he’d even gotten airborne.
Flying a car over Indian skies is no longer a dream limited by technology. Companies from across the world have been testing prototypes of flying cars. Dutch firm PAL-V International B.V. has been working on a Personal Air and Land Vehicle (PAL-V) for 16 year years now. With three wheels, their model handles like a nimble auto-rickshaw on the roads. Give it a runway, switch on a button – and a set of foldable rotors extend out, turning it into a gyrocopter. The company claims it can fly at 180 kilometres per hour (kph), running on regular gas from a petrol station.
The dream, rather, is dependent on navigating regulations. PAL-V International spent more than half their development budget making the vehicle comply with American and European flying norms. India is a whole different ball game when it comes to aviation regulations.
In 2007, they filed a patent application with the Indian Patent Office in Kolkata. The plan was to sell a vehicle in India by 2018 for a price of Rs. 3.79 crores.
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