Hundreds of Indians are queuing up at the Indian Consulate in Dubai to get their passports or emergency certificates in view of the three-month long amnesty declared by the UAE government.
Majority among the amnesty seekers were absconders who had come to the consulate upon learning that the Indian authorities had received thousands of passports of Indian citizens from the Dubai Naturalisation and Residency Department.
The amnesty began on June one and ends on August 31.
Special seating arrangements were made on Sunday for the amnesty seekers in the consulate auditorium as the huge rush of people had taken even the local authorities by surprise.
Amnesty-seekers started arriving at the consulate since early morning and local police was deployed near the entrance to ensure queues.
Confirming the problems faced by the Indian mission due to the heavy rush of amnesty seekers, Indian Consul General Venu Rajamony said, "We have received around 30,000 passports from DNRD. It is a big job to sort out all these passports and give them to their owners. The list of passports is available on the Indian Consulate Website: www.cgidubai.com"
"Due to the extra work generated on account of the amnesty announced by the UAE authorities and due to the holiday rush, the Consulate is facing unprecedented number of visitors. Sundays and Mondays are peak days at the Consulate," Rajamony said.
To avoid long waiting time, the public visiting the mission for various services may stagger their visits to Wednesdays and Thursdays whenever possible, he added.
"In order to cope with the rush, an Indian company has asked its volunteers to prepare the database of the passports received from the local immigration authorities," the Consul
General said, adding that with the database now ready, the consulate will distribute the passports.
"We will distribute the passports at the Indian High School premises and not in the Consulate," he said.
But apart from helping the amnesty-seekers, the mission is also supporting Indian workers to find jobs in the UAE.
"Many private companies in the UAE have come forward to help such skilled workers by opening counters at various centres where they are holding interviews and collecting resumes," Rajamony said.
The consulate has received 15,700 applications for Emergency Certificates till Sunday, while it has issued over 5,010 ECs.
Applications for emergency certificates are received at 11 centres for amnesty opened by the mission in each Emirate.
At the time of announcing the amnesty, the UAE government has stated that there were 350,000 illegal workers in the country, a majority of them likely to be Indians.
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