Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Uran Akademi
- Total aircraft
- 15
- Single-engine
- 13
- Multi-engine
- 2
- Bases
- 3
Where it flies
- Fursatganj, Uttar PradeshFursatganj Airfield, Raebareli, Amethi-, Uttar Pradesh 229302
- Gondia, MaharashtraAirport Authority of India, Birsi Airport, P.O.P; Paraswada, Gondia, Maharashtra , 441614
- Kalaburagi, KarnatakaKalaburagi Airport, Gulbarga Karnataka
Fleet
DGCA lists 15 aircraft — 13 single-engine and 2 multi-engine.
- Diamond DA-40
- Diamond DA-42
- Socata TB-20
- Zlin
DGCA approval
- Approval number
- 01/1999
- Valid from
- 27 Mar 2024
- Valid to
- 26 Mar 2029to 2029
- Ownership
- Government
- Serial in DGCA list
- #25
What the DGCA figures tell you
In its favour
- DGCA graded it Category B in the April 2026 ranking.
- 3 flying bases, which gives the school somewhere to send aircraft when one airfield is weather-bound or busy.
- DGCA approval runs to March 2029, so renewal is not an immediate question.
Check before you commit
- With several bases, confirm which airfield you would actually fly from and where you would live. The address you enrol at is not always where the hours happen.
- The nearest weather station is not the airfield itself for at least one base, so live reports are an approximation of what you would actually be flying in.
Every line above restates a figure from DGCA's published documents and says why it matters. Nothing here is our opinion of the school, and none of it measures teaching quality, which no public document reports.
Typical flying weather
Dense winter fog (Dec–Jan) can ground flying for days at a time, and the southwest monsoon runs Jul–Sep. Summer heat pushes density altitude up, which cuts useful load.
This is a broad regional pattern, not a forecast. What actually matters is how many days a year this base can fly — ask the school for its weather-cancelled sortie count.
Contact
Model this school's costAircraft-to-student ratio is the single best predictor of finishing on time, but DGCA does not publish student numbers — the fleet shown here is one half of that sum, and only the school can give you the other. Ask how many aircraft are serviceable today. Last transcribed 27 Jul 2026.
Beyond the DGCA list
Researched by us from the school's own site, Wikipedia and official pages, then dated and cited. This is weaker evidence than the DGCA figures above, and it is free editorial work: no school pays to appear here, and nothing in this section affects ordering, filtering or ranking anywhere on the site.
- Founded
- 1985
- Run by
- Ministry of Civil Aviation, Government of India
- Accommodation
- On-campus hostel
- The foundation stone was laid on 7 November 1985 by the then Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi.
- Cadets are selected through an all-India entrance examination rather than rolling admission. It is the only school in this directory that publishes such a process.
- The academy flew 19,110 hours in 2021–22, which it records as surpassing its previous best from 2013–14.
In its favour
- Selection is by an all-India entrance examination, so intake is capped by seats rather than by how many people can pay.
- The campus is residential, with hostels and mess run by the academy itself rather than arranged nearby.
- It sits directly under the Ministry of Civil Aviation, so it is not dependent on a single private owner's finances.
Check before you commit
- There is a real chance of not being selected. Have a second school in mind before you plan around this one.
- Ask what the current seat count is and how many candidates sat the last examination, because that ratio is the actual admission bar.
Weather at these bases
Fursatganj sits in the Indo-Gangetic plain, where December and January fog is the main cause of lost flying days. The Gondia and Kalaburagi bases lie outside that fog belt, which is part of why a multi-base academy loses fewer sorties in winter.
IGRUA is not a private flying school that happens to be large. It sits under the Ministry of Civil Aviation, its foundation stone was laid by the then Prime Minister in November 1985, and it is the only organisation in this directory that selects its cadets through an all-India entrance examination rather than taking students as they apply.
That single difference reshapes the decision. At a private FTO the constraint on starting is usually money and a medical. Here there is an exam in front of that, which means a real chance of not getting in, and a cohort that starts together rather than trickling through.
A selection process is not a quality guarantee, but it does mean intake is capped by seats rather than by demand. Ask what the current seat count is and how many candidates sat the last examination.
A residential campus, not just an airfield
The Fursatganj campus is residential, with hostels and mess on site. Most schools in this directory either say nothing about accommodation or point you at arrangements nearby, so an on-campus hostel that the academy itself operates is a genuine practical difference when you are budgeting.
The flying-hours record
The academy records 19,110 hours flown in 2021–22, which it describes as surpassing its previous best from 2013–14. Treat total-hours figures carefully: they measure the organisation's throughput, not your throughput. What decides your finish date is how many serviceable aircraft there are per student on the day you are trying to fly, and DGCA does not publish student numbers for any school.
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Being government-run does not automatically mean cheaper, and we do not publish per-school fees anywhere on this site because schools quote very different inclusions. Ask for an itemised quote and put it into the cost worksheet.
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No. The entrance examination is the academy's own selection filter. You still sit the DGCA ground examinations and hold the same licence at the end.