evidence: Civil Aviation Secretary Rajiv Nayan Choubey said that UDAN would leapfrog India’s aviation sector. "From a rate of one airport annually, we have leapfrogged to connecting 33 airports in a single year," Choubey said, adding the routes have a uniform spread across the country. [...] The Ministry of Civil Aviation (MoCA) is committed to providing air connectivity to currently underserved and unserved airports. To make air travel accessible to citizens in regionally important cities, the Ministry launched UDAN RCS in October 2016. The UDAN scheme was developed through extensive consideration of various issues and consultations with stakeholders. This is a first-of-its-kind scheme globally to stimulate regional connectivity through a market-based mechanism. The UDAN scheme is a key component of the National Civil Aviation Policy (NCAP) which was released by the MoCA on June 15, 2016. The Airports Authority of India (AAI) followed a transparent bidding process by inviting interested bidders and airline operators to submit their initial proposals under the provisions of RCS and subsequently inviting counter proposals against such initial proposals. The routes and networks are awarded to bidders who submitted valid proposals and quoted the lowest Viability Gap Funding (VGF) from the government for such routes and networks.