Union Science and Technology Minister Dr. Jitendra Singh announced on Wednesday, 8 July 2026 that CSIR-National Aerospace Laboratories (NAL), Bengaluru has completed the design phase of the Saras MkII, a 19-seater indigenous light transport aircraft, marking a significant milestone in India's civil aviation self-reliance drive.

Context

The minister described the development as a 'milestone breakthrough in the aviation sector,' stating that CSIR-NAL has 'wrapped up the design phase of the 19-seater Saras MkII, a testament to India's growing prowess in indigenous aircraft development.' The announcement positions the achievement within Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Atmanirbhar Bharat mission and the UDAN regional connectivity scheme.

CSIR-NAL, headquartered in Bengaluru, is India's premier aerospace research laboratory under the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR). The lab has been the nodal agency for India's indigenous civil aircraft programme since its inception, making the Saras MkII a direct continuation of that institutional mandate.

Policy Backdrop

The Saras programme traces its roots to 2004, when CSIR-NAL achieved the first flight of the original Saras PT-1 prototype — India's first indigenous civil aircraft effort. The current Saras MkII variant is designed specifically to serve the operational requirements of the UDAN (Ude Desh ka Aam Naagrik) scheme, which was launched in 2016 with explicit provisions for 19-seater category aircraft to connect underserved and remote airports.

The Atmanirbhar Bharat Abhiyan, announced in 2020, identified aerospace as a key sector for reducing India's import dependence. Completion of the design phase for a domestically engineered regional aircraft directly advances that policy objective, moving the programme closer to prototype fabrication and eventual certification.

Stakeholders and Impact

The Saras MkII's 19-seat capacity makes it particularly suited for high-altitude and short-runway operations where larger commercial jets are uneconomical or operationally infeasible. Remote regions — including parts of Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Jammu and Kashmir, and the Northeast — stand to benefit most directly if the aircraft enters UDAN-linked service.

Regional airlines bidding under the UDAN framework would gain access to a domestically produced aircraft, potentially reducing dependence on imported turboprops and lowering fleet acquisition costs. For CSIR-NAL, successful commercialisation of the Saras MkII would validate decades of institutional investment in civil aerospace design capability.

What's Next

The completion of the design phase moves the Saras MkII programme into the next critical stages: prototype fabrication, ground testing, and eventual airworthiness certification by the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA). Each stage will require sustained funding, inter-agency coordination, and regulatory clearances before the aircraft can be inducted into commercial regional operations.

The government's ability to sustain momentum through these technically demanding phases — and to integrate the Saras MkII into UDAN bidding rounds for specific routes — will determine whether this design milestone translates into operational impact for underserved communities across India.