New Delhi, July 30 -- The Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) on Wednesday said it has issued a detailed standard operating procedure (SOP) and framework for using drones to Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan in this upcoming winter season, to detect crop-burning incidents on a real-time basis. The SOP, issued to the chief secretaries of the four agrarian states, asks for drone deployment to be done preferably between 3 pm and 9 pm - when farmers are more likely to make attempts to evade satellite detection, it said.

The SOP also calls for states to maintain a central database of all drone-captured videos till at least three months after the harvesting season is over; to prepare detailed drone flight plans and to ident...