DGCA Class 1 and Class 2 Medical: Tests, Centres and Validity

What is the difference between a Class 1 and a Class 2 medical?#

Two certificates, two different jobs. The Class 2 is the entry-level fitness check. It is enough for a Student Pilot Licence and a PPL, which means it is enough to start training and to fly solo. The Class 1 is the full aeromedical assessment, and you need it before you exercise commercial privileges on a CPL or an ATPL.

Students always ask which one to book first. Book the Class 2. It is the cheap screening step that tells you whether the expensive one is realistic, and doing it in the other order is how people lose money they did not need to lose.

This article is procedural guidance on how the DGCA medical system works. It is not medical advice, and the fitness decision on any individual file rests with the DGCA-approved aeromedical examiner who assesses you.

Which medical should you do first, and why?#

Class 2 first. Always. The reasoning is not medical, it is financial. You are buying information at the point where the information is still cheap enough to act on.

A colour vision deficiency found at the screening stage costs you a consultation fee and a Saturday morning. The same finding discovered after you have paid a ground school fee, moved cities and started burning flying hours costs you lakhs, and none of that money comes back.

What does the DGCA Class 1 medical check?#

The assessment follows ICAO Annex 1 aligned standards. It is a full day of examinations rather than a single consultation, and the investigations ordered vary with your age and history. A nineteen-year-old with a clean record and a thirty-four-year-old career changer do not walk out with the same stack of reports.

• Vision: distance and near acuity, colour vision, refraction, use of corrective lenses
• Hearing: audiometry against aviation thresholds
• Cardiovascular: history, blood pressure, resting ECG, further cardiac work-up where indicated
• General clinical examination: ENT, dental, musculoskeletal, neurological, abdominal
• Laboratory work: blood, urine and other investigations by age and risk factors
• Psychological and history review

How does the Class 1 assessment day actually run?#

Think of it as six queues rather than one appointment. Nothing about the day is difficult, but everything about it is sequential, and a missing document at stage two holds up stage six.

1. 1Book the slot at an approved centre. Appointments fill up. Book several weeks ahead, and confirm the reporting time and the document list at the time of booking rather than the night before.
2. 2Report with your records. Original reports of every past illness, surgery, hospital admission and course of medication. A discharge summary you can describe but not produce is worth nothing to the file.
3. 3Registration and declared history. You complete a medical history declaration. Declare fully, including what you think is trivial. This is the most consequential piece of paper you will handle that day.
4. 4Laboratory work. Blood and urine samples are usually taken early so results are back before the file closes. Which investigations are ordered depends on age and risk factors.
5. 5Specialist stations. Vision and refraction, audiometry, cardiovascular including a resting ECG, then ENT, dental, musculoskeletal, neurological and abdominal examinations.
6. 6File review and disposal. The examiner reviews everything together. Three outcomes exist: fit, deferred pending a specialist opinion or further test, or unfit.

Where is the initial Class 1 medical done in India?#

Initial Class 1 assessments are conducted at DGCA-approved aeromedical evaluation centres. The two most commonly used by student pilots are AFCME in New Delhi and the Institute of Aerospace Medicine, Indian Air Force, in Bengaluru. Other Indian Air Force centres and DGCA-empanelled civil facilities also appear on the approved list, which DGCA publishes.

Appointments at the busy centres fill up. Book several weeks ahead, and carry every past medical record you hold, including old prescriptions and surgical notes. The Class 2, by contrast, is done by a DGCA-authorised medical examiner and is far easier to schedule.

The current list of approved centres is published by DGCA. Check it before booking rather than relying on a coaching centre recommendation.

How long does a medical stay valid?#

Validity is not a hurdle you clear once. It is a recurring obligation attached to the licence for as long as you fly, and the renewal cycle is short enough that it needs a diary entry rather than a memory.

• Class 1 for commercial operations: 12 months
• Class 1 for student and private licences: 24 months
• Class 2: as endorsed, and renewed on the schedule stated on the certificate

Renewal is a lifelong obligation. A lapsed Class 1 grounds a working airline pilot exactly as it grounds a student, and a renewal appointment at a busy centre is not something you arrange in a week.

What does the medical cost?#

Class 1 assessments commonly run between Rs 8,000 and Rs 15,000 at approved centres. Plan Rs 25,000 to Rs 50,000 across both classes once repeat investigations, travel to the centre and specialist referrals are counted, because very few students get through on the base fee alone.

Any additional test the examiner orders, such as a treadmill test or a specialist opinion, is billed on top. Travel is the line students forget. If you live in Kochi and your slot is in Bengaluru, the fare and two nights of accommodation belong in the medical budget, not in some other column.

For scale: the DGCA theory examination fee is Rs 2,500 per paper across five papers, and ground school runs Rs 1.5 lakh to Rs 3 lakh. The medical costs less than either and decides whether either is worth paying for.

What commonly causes a Class 1 to be deferred?#

Deferral is more common than outright rejection. A finding that needs a specialist opinion pauses your file rather than closing it, and students who hear the word deferred and assume their career is over are usually wrong.

The list below is what actually shows up. Notice that the last item is not a medical condition at all.

• Colour vision deficiency, which is the single most common hard stop for aspiring pilots
• Uncorrected visual acuity outside limits, or refractive error beyond the permitted range
• Blood pressure readings outside limits on repeated measurement
• Hearing loss beyond audiometric thresholds
• Body mass index outside acceptable limits
• Undeclared past surgery or medication history discovered during the examination

Declare your history honestly. A finding you concealed and the examiner discovers is treated far more seriously than the finding itself. If any of these worry you, take the question and your records to a DGCA-approved aeromedical examiner before you plan anything else.

What happens if your Class 1 is deferred?#

A deferral is not a refusal. It means the examiner wants something before deciding: a specialist opinion, a repeated measurement, a report you did not bring. The file stays open. What a deferral costs you is time, and time in flight training is expensive in ways students consistently underestimate.

Only a DGCA-approved aeromedical examiner can tell you what your file needs and where it stands. Do not take clinical reassurance from an instructor, an agent or an internet forum, and do not attempt to work around a finding.

Can you fly with spectacles?#

Yes, provided your corrected vision falls within DGCA limits. The assessment records your refraction and the correction you use, and that goes on the file. Glasses end far fewer flying careers than students believe.

Colour vision is the different animal. It is the single most common hard stop for aspiring pilots in India, it is not something a lens corrects, and it is testable at any ophthalmologist for a few hundred rupees. Do that one test before you spend money on anything else.

This page does not publish clinical thresholds. The applicable standards are set by DGCA and applied by the approved examiner, and a borderline number is a conversation to have with that examiner, not with an instructor.

How should you prepare before you book?#

None of this is about passing something you would otherwise fail. It is about arriving with a complete file so that the assessment measures you rather than your paperwork.

1. 1Get a colour vision test first. Any ophthalmologist can do it for a few hundred rupees. Doing this before you spend on training is the highest-return decision in the entire process.
2. 2Sort out dental issues in advance. Dental findings routinely delay files. Treatment you finish beforehand is a queue you do not stand in later.
3. 3Collect your original records. Every past illness, surgery, hospital admission and course of medication, in original, in one folder, sorted by date.
4. 4Do not crash diet. Laboratory results will show it. A rushed weight change in the weeks before the assessment tends to produce exactly the abnormal readings you were hoping to avoid.
5. 5Book with margin. Leave several weeks between the assessment and the start of your flying block, so that a deferral does not wreck the schedule behind it.

Where does the medical sit in the CPL timeline?#

The medical is the first stage in a CPL plan and the only stage that can end the plan outright. Everything after it is a question of money, effort and patience. That is why we put it at the front of every student schedule, ahead of the computer number and well ahead of the first school visit.

A CPL also needs minimum age 18, 10+2 with Physics and Mathematics, 200 hours, ICAO English Language Proficiency Level 4 or above and RTR(A). A PPL needs age 17 and 40 hours, an ATPL age 21 and 1,500 hours, and an SPL can be issued from 16. DGCA sets no maximum age for registering as a flight crew candidate.

What do students get wrong about the medical?#

The same mistakes come round every batch, and almost none of them are medical. They are mistakes about sequencing, paperwork and honesty, which means every one of them is avoidable.

One sentence worth carrying into the centre: the finding is often workable through a specialist opinion, the concealment never is.