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Edhitha UAS
NIDAR 2026

NIDAR 2026

1st in Disaster Management. First place among 350+ teams across India, including IITs.

Result
1st, Disaster Management
Autonomy
Fully autonomous
Teams
350+ across India
Organisers
DFI and MeitY
Venue
Gautam Buddha University, Greater Noida
Date
January 2026
Mission window
30 minutes, finished in under 15

1stin Disaster Management.

NIDAR, the National Innovation Challenge for Drone Application and Research, is organised by the Drone Federation of India and MeitY. Team Edhitha entered the Disaster Management category and won it, ahead of 350+ teams from across the country.

Our entry was a system of two drones sharing one mission state, each surveying half of the area and delivering to the survivors it found, all coordinated by a ROS pipeline built so that no two aircraft ever take the same task. The whole mission was flown fully autonomously, from take-off to landing.

The aircraft
Rudra, the droneRudraThe larger drone. Surveys its half of the area and, with the longer endurance, delivers most of the payloads.
Barbarik, the droneBarbarikThe smaller drone. Surveys the other half, delivers to the survivors it finds and lands first.
Ground control station
Live mission statusBoth drones and every detected target in real time.
Detection image feedOperators review, confirm or reject detections before dispatch and edit them live during delivery.
Mission overrideReassign targets, reprioritise the delivery order or trigger return-to-launch on each drone independently.
Dual-channel commsLTE for state sync and the web UI, RFD modules for telemetry.
Skip animation ↓
How the mission ran

Both drones take off

Rudra and Barbarik take off together and fly the whole mission fully autonomously. The area is split in half and each drone gets a lawnmower survey path for its own half.

How the mission ran

First detection

The vision model flags the first survivor mid-flight. The coordinate is geotagged and pushed to the shared mission state at once.

How the mission ran

Survey complete

Each drone finishes its half, and every survivor found is in the shared mission state, so no target is ever taken twice.

How the mission ran

First payloads dropped

Each drone flies to a survivor it found, repositions visually and releases a tethered payload smoothly.

How the mission ran

Barbarik lands

Barbarik, the smaller drone, lands first. Rudra has the longer endurance and carries on with the remaining deliveries.

How the mission ran

Mission complete

Every payload delivered, no duplicates, both drones home about 15 minutes in, with 15 to spare.