India, UAE to make mobility easier for workers, tourists and businesses

India and the UAE are streamlining visas, extradition, and legal cooperation to boost travel, business, and security. Talks focus on liberalised visas, faster extradition, mutual legal assistance, and smoother movement for workers, tourists, and professionals amid growing bilateral trade

New Delhi: India and the UAE are taking major steps to make travel smoother and strengthen legal cooperation, marking a new phase in their fast-growing strategic partnership.

Both countries are focusing on easier visas, faster extradition and closer coordination between their legal systems. The aim is to make movement simpler for workers, tourists and businesses, while also tightening the fight against financial crime and fugitives who operate between the two nations.

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At the sixth meeting of the India’s UAE Joint Committee on Consular Affairs held in Abu Dhabi last month, officials from both sides agreed to work on four key areas, according to India Narrative report. These include liberalising visa rules, improving the flow of information, ensuring better consular access and speeding up cooperation on extradition and mutual legal assistance.

While no big new agreement has been announced yet, the discussions clearly show that both governments want more predictable, long-term cooperation rather than handling issues case by case. India has already expanded visa-on-arrival facilities for UAE nationals, increasing the number of airports offering this service from six to nine by adding Kochi, Calicut and Ahmedabad.

These locations especially benefit travellers connected to Gulf business hubs and states with large Indian communities.

On the other hand, the UAE has broadened its own visa-on-arrival scheme for more categories of Indian travellers, particularly professionals with foreign residence permits, making short-notice travel much easier.

The push for easier visas is driven by strong economic and political reasons. Bilateral trade between India and the UAE has already crossed about 100 billion dollars in 2024-25 under the CEPA trade pact. Faster business travel, smoother project work and predictable mobility for professionals are essential for fully using the potential of the agreement.

With over 4.2 million Indians living in the UAE, mobility is also a major welfare issue for India and a labour-market factor for the UAE. Simplified visas for Emirati citizens entering India also send a message that travel and investment flow both ways.

On the security side, India and the UAE already have an extradition treaty, and cooperation has steadily expanded. The recent talks focused on speeding up processes rather than rewriting laws. In practical terms, this means quicker examination of extradition requests, better alignment of documents and stronger political will to avoid delays.

Faster action from the UAE can significantly impact India’s efforts to bring back economic offenders who once considered Dubai a safe escape route. Both countries are also working to strengthen mutual legal assistance, which is crucial for tackling cybercrime, financial crime, terror financing and misuse of corporate structures.

As India and the UAE deepen economic engagement through food corridors, logistics projects and major investments, faster sharing of financial records, ownership details and digital evidence becomes essential. This cooperation can prevent criminals from exploiting differences in regulations and operating across borders unnoticed.