UAE's Golden Visa Drawing Professionals, Entrepreneurs From India

Tax-free regime, high standards of living in Emirates among their reasons for relocation

- Rohini Mohan

BENGALURU - More than two decades after he first set foot in Dubai for work, Mr J. Kumaresan finally received his Golden visa in 2023. It was a feat possible for the 56-year-old engineer only after the United Arab Emirates (UAE) recently eased its long-term residency programme to attract and retain global talent and capital.

The oil and gas contracts manager from India is not the only one who has moved from one of the world's largest economies to the Emirates.

Wealthy Indians, entrepreneurs and skilled professionals are choosing the UAE for its tax-free regime, high standards of living and low rates of crime, those who have relocated told The Sunday Times. It is also geographically and culturally closer to India than the US or Europe.

"Dubai is great for my field of work in the energy sector, and it is culturally familiar. I can also save much more money for my family by staying in Dubai, which has a more affordable cost of living than other places I have worked in, like Singapore," said Mr Kumaresan.

Mr Kumaresan feels at home in Dubai, which has more than half of the four million-strong Indian diaspora in the UAE, including middle- and low-income Indians in fields like construction and hospitality.

Trade flows between India and the UAE topped US$100 billion (S$128 billion) in the 2024 to 2025 financial year, rising from nearly US$73 billion in 2021 to 2022 after both countries signed an economic partnership agreement in 2022.

The UAE is now India's third-largest trading partner after the US and China.

As the US, Britain and other major Western nations have tightened immigration policies for South Asians of late, affluent and educated Indians are now joining the millions of low-income migrant workers who have long thronged the Gulf region.