The police in the southern Indian state of Karnataka has become of the first in the country to acquire and use a fleet of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). The state police is deploying the drones to detect illegal sand mining.

For now, Karnataka Police has acquired 12 South Korean drones, which are being operated by 20 police officials in six districts of the state. The Phantom 4 UAVs have been purchased for Rs 150,000 each, and are equipped with 18.2 MP cameras and night vision. They can rise to a height of 1 km, and remain in the air for over half-an-hour.

A police spokesperson said that the cops had already successfully deployed the drones to detect illegal sand mining along the state’s border, and kept the monitoring stealthy by taping the illuminated parts.

While the commercial and civilian use of drones remains restricted, government organisations such as the Indian Railways and police departments have experimented with the use of drones to track the completion of pending projects and monitor law and order. There are also many cases of police departments in Delhi and Mumbai closely tracking the use of drones around high-security areas like airports and defence establishments.

This is because India’s current aircraft laws do not cover the purchase, sale and use of civilian and commercial drones. In April, the authorities ruled that passengers entering the country would have to declare their possession of drones upon arrival and pay an extra duty on it. More recently, India’s Directorate General of Civil Aviation proposed guidelines for registering all civilian UAVs and giving them a unique identification number to “regulate unwarranted use of drones”.