Thousands of non-resident Indians have returned home to cast their vote in the world’s largest democratic election.
As the election enters the final stretch, with counting set to begin on June 4, those residing abroad say travelling thousands of kilometres to vote is their message to people living in India to get to polling stations as every vote counts.
Some have volunteered at polling stations while others round up friends and family to cast their ballot.
I wanted to give my friends and family in India a message that if I can travel 4,500km to vote, then why don’t you?
Vishnu Ippili,
Abu Dhabi resident and NRI
Many who live in Gulf nations have also appealed to fellow Indians abroad to ask their families back home to vote.
Indians residing overseas cannot vote unless they travel to their constituency.
They have repeatedly urged the government to allow them to cast their vote at embassies, via postal ballots or online voting.
Until such legislation is approved, millions of Indians residing abroad must travel home to vote along with about 970 million citizens.
People must have their say
Dubai businessman Ramakant Dixit will accompany his parents in his hometown, Lucknow, in northern India to vote on Monday.
“My father is 80 and mother is 76, and it’s important to me to be home on voting day,” Mr Dixit, 58, told The National on a call from Lucknow.
“I tell my family and friends – no matter who you are voting for, whatever your ideology, please go and vote.”
A longtime supporter of the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Mr Dixit has travelled to southern states such as Telangana and Andhra Pradesh where the ruling party is keen to make inroads.
The ruling BJP won by a landslide in 2019, securing 303 parliamentary seats. However, it only won 29 constituencies in five southern states and did not win a single seat in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala.
“I went to the south to feel the pulse, to understand what is going on,” Mr Dixit said.
“I really believe the BJP will make a dent in the south this time but people must go out and have their say.
“I’m a diehard Modi fan and I think we will win because of the infrastructure, roads and rail projects that are great for people and the country.”
Flying visits
Some Indians living abroad made a quick dash home to vote but they said it was not an easy trip.
Dubai resident Sunil Kumar flew to Hyderabad, in southern India, and returned to the UAE the same afternoon.
He reached the polling booth at 6.30am on May 13 but found several people in the queue.
Mr Kumar, 60, a project co-ordinator, showed them his airline ticket to get ahead in the line so he could report to work in the UAE later that afternoon.
“My wife and I voted as soon as the station opened and I was able to make my 10am flight to Dubai,” he said.
IT manager Vishnu Ippili travelled about 15 hours, including a 10-hour bus ride, to reach a remote village Kalimela in eastern Odisha state.
The Abu Dhabi resident met dozens of Indian expatriates at Hyderabad airport as they arrived to cast their vote.
Mr Ippili, 47, said he made the journey because it was crucial to bring development to his village.
The six-week exercise includes parliamentary and state assembly elections.
“I saw many people travel from Australia, US, Canada and the UK to vote,” Mr Ippili said.
“I wanted to give my friends and family in India a message that if I can travel 4,500km to vote, then why don’t you?”
House calls to encourage voting
Dubai resident NP Ramachandran is in Mumbai hoping to galvanise people to vote on Monday.
The vice president of UAE’s Indian Cultural and Arts Society, which is affiliated with the Congress, voted in Kerala state last month.
Over the past few weeks, Mr Ramachandran, 67, has met about 20 families each day, starting with 9am home visits.
“We go to areas where there are families with relatives living overseas,” he said.
“We talk to them about the Congress candidates we support. We tell them they must utilise their right to vote.
“Sometimes people need a phone call or a visit as motivation.”
Mr Ramachandran said assisting people as an election volunteer in his hometown Thrissur brought him satisfaction.
“Many people don’t know which polling station they should go to and I help them reach the right place,” he said.
UAE-based Congress supporters helped to negotiate cheaper airline tickets too – about Dh340 for a one-way fare to cities in Kerala, which is less than half the normal cost – to encourage people to travel home to vote.
“At least 5,000 people from the UAE voted in Kerala,” Mr Ramachandran said. “There were also people from Saudi, Muscat, Qatar and Kuwait.”
Spreading the party message
KTA Muneer, a Congress supporter from Saudi Arabia, travelled to Kerala, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh to spread his party’s message.
“I travelled to campaign for victory of the Congress-led United Democratic Front alliance,” said Mr Muneer, 49, who runs a travel consultancy in Jeddah.
“We identify places where there are families of NRIs and explain that they will be better looked after and how the Congress will keep in mind the welfare of NRIs when we come to power.”
Dubai resident SV Reddy is part of a team that reaches out to workers in the Gulf region.
“We tell them to call their families at home to vote,” said the president of the Congress NRI Gulf cell.
“We explain how important this is and hope more people listen.”
As part of staggered voting, the next rounds are on May 20, May 25 and June 1.
The results of 543 lower house constituencies will be announced on June 4.
Zayed Sustainability Prize
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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Starring: Tom Cruise, Hayley Atwell, Simon Pegg
Rating: 4/5
Defence review at a glance
• Increase defence spending to 2.5% of GDP by 2027 but given “turbulent times it may be necessary to go faster”
• Prioritise a shift towards working with AI and autonomous systems
• Invest in the resilience of military space systems.
• Number of active reserves should be increased by 20%
• More F-35 fighter jets required in the next decade
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Planes grounded by coronavirus
British Airways: Cancels all direct flights to and from mainland China
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Chicago-based United Airlines: Reducing flights to Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong
Ai Seoul: Suspended all flights to China
Finnair: Suspending flights to Nanjing and Beijing Daxing until the end of March
Indonesia's Lion Air: Suspending all flights to China from February
South Korea's Asiana Airlines, Jeju Air and Jin Air: Suspend all flights
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The burning issue
The internal combustion engine is facing a watershed moment – major manufacturer Volvo is to stop producing petroleum-powered vehicles by 2021 and countries in Europe, including the UK, have vowed to ban their sale before 2040. The National takes a look at the story of one of the most successful technologies of the last 100 years and how it has impacted life in the UAE.
Read part four: an affection for classic cars lives on
Read part three: the age of the electric vehicle begins
Read part one: how cars came to the UAE
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Dubai Rugby Sevens, December 5 -7
World Sevens Series Pools
A – Fiji, France, Argentina, Japan
B – United States, Australia, Scotland, Ireland
C – New Zealand, Samoa, Canada, Wales
D – South Africa, England, Spain, Kenya
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Date started: March 2020
Co-founder/CEO: Ahmed Eissa
Based: UAE, Abu Dhabi
Sector: Insurance Sector
Size: 50 full-time employees (Inside and Outside UAE)
Stage: Seed stage and seeking Series A round of financing
Investors: Safe City Group
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The specs: Fenyr SuperSport
Price, base: Dh5.1 million
Engine: 3.8-litre twin-turbo flat-six
Transmission: Seven-speed automatic
Power: 800hp @ 7,100pm
Torque: 980Nm @ 4,000rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 13.5L / 100km
About Krews
Founder: Ahmed Al Qubaisi
Based: Abu Dhabi
Founded: January 2019
Number of employees: 10
Sector: Technology/Social media
Funding to date: Estimated $300,000 from Hub71 in-kind support
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Our Time Has Come
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In numbers: PKK’s money network in Europe
Germany: PKK collectors typically bring in $18 million in cash a year – amount has trebled since 2010
Revolutionary tax: Investigators say about $2 million a year raised from ‘tax collection’ around Marseille
Extortion: Gunman convicted in 2023 of demanding $10,000 from Kurdish businessman in Stockholm
Drug trade: PKK income claimed by Turkish anti-drugs force in 2024 to be as high as $500 million a year
Denmark: PKK one of two terrorist groups along with Iranian separatists ASMLA to raise “two-digit million amounts”
Contributions: Hundreds of euros expected from typical Kurdish families and thousands from business owners
TV channel: Kurdish Roj TV accounts frozen and went bankrupt after Denmark fined it more than $1 million over PKK links in 2013
