Discrimination Against Indians in the UAE: A Research Overview

Introduction

The United Arab Emirates was formed in 1971 under conditions that would set it apart from the rest of the Arab sphere, achieving a unified "trucial" status with the British colonial presence in the Middle East. This allowed it to make the transition into independence without the revolution and upheaval that had been necessary in so many other Middle Eastern states. Its oil wealth and its receptiveness to western intervention in the form of Foreign Direct Investment helped to expedite and ease this process. Today, it is without question the fastest-growing economy in the Middle East. A variety of indicators rank it among the largest economies in the world, and its two major emirates — Abu Dhabi and Dubai — are top destinations for multinational corporations, businessmen, and unskilled laborers, all of whom have tended to flock to the UAE for an opportunity index that appears exponentially better than that of most neighboring states.

In spite of this prosperity, the Emirates continues to reflect a culture rife with inequalities and prejudices. The conditions faced by its Indian labor class stand as a chief example of discriminatory housing practices, religious hostility, labor abuse, and repressive legal mistreatment.

Research Questions and Context

As we enter into a discussion of the social and economic disenfranchisement of the Indian population of the UAE, the research is guided by broader questions concerning the private, professional, and public spheres of the nation as they relate to ethnicity, religion, and geopolitical orientation. The overarching research question asks: to what extent do Indian nationals face discrimination and inequality in the United Arab Emirates? The literature review engages a discourse on the complex array of intervening conditions — both within and outside the Emirates — that makes this discrimination so persistent.

Housing Discrimination and the India-Pakistan Backdrop

The UAE is at once seen as progressive relative to other nations in its region and yet given over to distinct imbalances along lines of ethnicity and gender — due in no small part to its religious uniformity — and its economic system proceeds in a difficult and somewhat contradictory mode (SR, 1). In a nation markedly composed, more than any other country in the world, of immigrant residents, there is nevertheless an internal orientation that risks leaving much of that citizenry behind as the oil economy advances (UNICEF, 1).

The treatment given to many Indian expatriates who have made their home in the Emirates is explicit in its willful effort to isolate and disadvantage them. A 2007 article notes that "an Indian national who has lived all his life in UAE expressed his shock when the Giant Real Estate agents mentioned that Indian customers would not be leased the apartment, and that they were under 'strict instructions' from landlords to consider only Europeans as tenants for the apartment" (DREM, 1). This is one of many areas in which there appears to be a cultural tendency to marginalize the significant Indian population both economically and socially. In a region where Islamic faith and capitalism intersect with uncommonly seamless interdependence, many of the global conflicts that affect this relationship are evident in the cultural discomfort still present throughout the region, and in the Emirates in particular.

Among these conflicts, the broader culture's tendency toward explicit gender inequality and its sympathy for the struggles facing Muslims abroad both mark the UAE as less culturally progressive than its economic status implies. The treatment which Indians face in the UAE reflects both racial prejudice and discrimination rooted in the highly charged conflict between India and its neighbor Pakistan. The ongoing tension between the predominantly Hindu state of India and the world's most populous Muslim nation helps to underscore the cultural rift that manifests throughout the eastern sphere, with the Emirates demonstrating the impact of a more highly integrated — yet still fractured — setting.

Pakistan's relationship with India has long been a defining element of its modern existence as well as a high-priority issue for the global Muslim population. In particular, the disputed zone of Kashmir has throughout both states' histories been a cause for hostilities. "Three full-scale wars — in 1947–48, 1965 and 1971 — and a constant state of military preparedness on both sides of their mutual border have marked the half-century of bitter rivalry between India and Pakistan" (Kronstadt, 3). This rivalry even provoked the acquisition of nuclear weapons on both sides, with Pakistan and India becoming the first two nations of the developing world to achieve successful nuclear programs. Beginning in 1972, Pakistan became an active producer of nuclear power.

This ultimately led to the 1988 India-Pakistan nuclear agreement, which placed regulatory control over the production and demonstration of further nuclear capability. That breakthrough in relations was followed by a range of agreements between the two states intended to gradually scale down military tensions (Pojer, 1). Nonetheless, religious tensions continued to dominate affairs in the Kashmiri region, culminating in the 1998 nuclear tests conducted by both Pakistan and India. These tests alarmed the world community, bringing about greater recognition of the need for international oversight of nuclear practices and invoking UN sanctions against both nations. The tests set off yet another period of intense hostility between the two nations, with localized skirmishes producing widespread violence and a lasting sense of global hostility between Muslim populations and Indian nationals abroad. At present, "India blames Pakistan for supporting a violent separatist rebellion in the Muslim-dominated Kashmir Valley that has taken between 40,000 and 90,000 lives since 1989" (Kronstadt, 3). Though the region is currently in a state of ceasefire, it remains an uneasy and temporary peace with no defined resolution on the immediate horizon. As a result, even with hostilities at a temporary cessation, Indians must face open social exclusion or tension in many parts of the Arab world. With the UAE being one of the chief economic destinations in the region, it has become one of the likeliest points of friction for this type of interaction.

Thus, as we return to the housing issue, we find that — like the ceasefire in Kashmir — the official policy in the UAE is one of intended compatibility, but behaviors still reflect the deep-seated and pronounced feeling of hostility between these demographics (Bener et al., 1). Legal policy does explicitly prohibit the kind of discrimination that has locked many Indian citizens out of housing. "But the problem with such cases is that they are difficult to prove. After all, the landlord can always defend himself by claiming that he refused the tenant for personal reasons. Nevertheless, in cases where racism is proven, the trade license of the landlord can be revoked by the authorities concerned" (DREM, 1). This points to an imbalance that is not legal but is genuinely entrenched.

As the literature makes clear, there is a distinct pattern of ethnic discrimination in the UAE at a wholesale level. Tensions between Indian and Arab populations are certainly present, but the modern capitalist integration of the Emirates belies a continued sense of cultural and ethnic isolation between groups — an isolation most certainly precipitated by economic interests. Where both housing and employment are concerned, evidence abounds of a diverse but deeply segregated society, with examination of the nation's most populated cities revealing "many signs demonstrating discrimination based on not only nationality but also by which area of a country people come from, and by religion" (Seabee, 1). Perhaps more than anything else, these conditions of segregation are indicative of a nation that has been integrated not organically but by the call of capitalism — producing a widely transplanted and uncomfortably diversified population in a region more often than not characterized by sharp, and sometimes violent, forms of cultural isolation.

Wage Inequality and Economic Exploitation

The socioeconomic motives described above also exert a strong influence on the nature of discrimination, which assumes a distinct economic hierarchy based on wage patterns derived from different national backgrounds. Countless anecdotal cases have emerged in the literature to demonstrate that the correlation between wage and ethnicity is based on assumptions about the income expectations that one's nationality has produced. A 2004 case illustrates this pattern clearly: "S.M. Kumar, an IT engineer, was offered a monthly wage of Dh4,000 while working in his home state of Goa, on the west coast of India. He thought his dream had come true. Dh4,000 meant Rs52,000. Only when he arrived in the UAE did he realise he had been hoodwinked. His Arab counterpart with the same qualifications, skills and experience was being paid Dh7,000, and his Western colleague still more — Dh10,000" (Salama, 1).

The evidence is stark that even where skilled labor is concerned, there remains an extremely entrenched sense that differentials in wage expectation represent an opportunity for exploitation and greater profitability among employers. In some of the broader economic patterns, ethnic prejudices and religious hostility may not even enter the calculation directly. Instead, this constitutes a form of economic opportunism which, not unlike the categorical exploitation of low-wage migrant labor in other industrialized nations, has manifested as a devastating form of economic discrimination.

The results are demonstrably damaging to the Indian population of the Emirates, which has not experienced the wholesale economic elevation that has marked the nation as a whole. This is especially true in periods of global recession, which leave this oft-mistreated group to bear the brunt of negative trends such as low wages, poor labor conditions, and unemployment. As a result, "Indians and other expatriates in the UAE are increasingly becoming susceptible to the scourge of depression, research has shown. The prime causes are discrimination at the workplace, longer working hours, homesickness, and the chaotic state of peak-hour traffic" (INP, 1). These conditions are part of a pattern rooted in a relative absence of political representation, community support structures, and economic opportunity for the disenfranchised Indian national population.

Conclusion

The account conducted here and the broader study proposed are both motivated by the argument that the UAE is a nation on the cusp of modernity that is nonetheless steeped in obsolete prejudices. These are especially manifested in the experience of the Indian population, which — for reasons of racial, religious, and economic distinction — occupies the bottom rung of the social ladder in the Emirates. This is part of a willful and untenable culture of discrimination that is counterintuitive to the current path of progress there.

Ultimately, the policy and economic future of the United Arab Emirates will be determined by its willingness to draw a more direct parallel between its global economic ambitions, its cultural particularities, and its ethnic tensions. At present, the UAE suffers for no want of foreign investors. Interest and speculation remain high, with plans for major developmental projects in Dubai and Abu Dhabi suggesting that opportunities are only now on the threshold of realization in this most receptive of Gulf states. However, its social orientation remains at odds with that of many of its trade partners and with the perspective of many who relocate there for business purposes. Addressing the systemic discrimination faced by its Indian population is not merely a moral imperative — it is a prerequisite for the kind of stable, inclusive growth the Emirates claims to seek.

Works Cited

Abu Dhabi Education Council. (2007). Homepage. Abu Dhabi, UAE.

Al Bawaba. (2006). UAE Education Ministry Signs Three-Year MOU as GESS Supporter. UAE Al Bawaba.

Bener, A., Abdulrazzaq, Y. M., al-Gazali, L. I., Micallef, R., al-Khayat, A. I., & Gaber, T. (1996). Consanguinity and associated socio-demographic factors in the United Arab Emirates.

Dubai Real Estate News (DREM). (2007). Tenants See Discrimination Among Nationalities. Dubai Estates.

India News Portal (INP). (2006). Indian Expats in UAE Facing Depression. SIFY.

Kronstadt, A. K. (2005). Pakistan-U.S. Relations. CRS Issue Brief for Congress.

Mahapatra, D. (2007). No one to fight for Indian workers in Gulf. The Times of India.

Makkah. (2007). UAE detains 3000 Indian workers over camp riot. The Islamic Workplace.

Pojer, S. M. (2006). India-Pakistan Crisis. Primary Source Documents.

Salama, S. (2004). Wage Woes: Equal Work, Unequal Pay. Financial Times Ltd.

Seabee, A. (2007). Discrimination in Dubai. Dubai Thoughts.

Staff Reporter (SR). (2007). Abu Dhabi Economy Challenges Global Market With Solid Growth. Khaleej Times.

UNICEF. (2007). At a Glance: United Arab Emirates. UNICEF.

United Arab Emirates (UAE). (2008). History. Arabic German Consulting.

United States State Department (DoS). (2007). Background Note: United Arab Emirates. Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs.