Out of the 286,000 illegal workers in the UAE, 70,000 Indians have left and the remaining 40,000 have found jobs or adjusted their job status in the country under the recently concluded amnesty offer.
Nearly 110,000 Indians took advantage of the amnesty offered by the UAE government to correct their job status or leave the country.
"About 286,000 workers either corrected their status or left the country during the three-month amnesty period, which started June 3, indicating that the violators responded positively to the amnesty offer as the statistics and records show", said Assistant Undersecretary of Labour, Obaid Rashid Al Zahmi.
The amnesty offered by the UAE Cabinet to help illegal
workers has achieved its goals, said Al Zahmi.
He warned that legal action will be taken against illegal workers now that the amnesty has expired.
Before the amnesty, there were 300,000 to 350,000, illegal workers, according to some official estimates. There are over 2.9 million workers employed by 285,000 firms in the UAE.
Construction companies recruit a larger number of workers than they actually need, citing the size of work, which leads to the accumulation of foreign workforce in the country, he said.
In addition, some shop owners conceal illegal workers so that they can employ them with lower salaries. Some free zones recruit workers and then allow them to work with other employers.
