NEW DELHI: Dubai Unlocked was able to focus only on the ‘known names’.
The “Dubai Unlocked” report recently published by an international consortium of journalists, has revealed details about properties in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE), purchased by foreigners, based on leaked property-related data. So far, the report has disclosed the names of four Indian nationals involved in these transactions.
However, in reality, by the end of 2022, Indians were the largest foreign buyers of properties in Dubai. The value of property held in Dubai by Indian nationals was $29.1 billion at the end of 2022. It was $23.7 billion in 2020. In 2020, Indians owned 36,660 properties, in 2022 it was 35,197.
This was revealed by a report of the EU Tax Observatory, an independent research laboratory hosted by the Paris School of Economics in its report, “Foreign Investment in the Dubai Housing Market, 2020-2024”, which was released on 15 May. The report by the EU Tax Observatory found that Indians topped the list of foreign nationals owning property in Dubai, followed by nationals of the United Kingdom, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran.
The leaked data that was used in “Dubai unlocked” was obtained by the Centre for Advanced Defence Studies (C4ADS), a non-profit organisation based in Washington, D.C., which researches international crimes and conflicts. The same was then shared with Norwegian financial newspaper E24 and the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), which coordinated an investigative project with media outlets including 74 partners from 58 countries.
It is pertinent to mention that in February 2024, the UAE was removed from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) “grey list” after its introduction in the said list in 2022 for not bringing policies to tackle money laundering, terrorist financing and proliferation financing. The removal from the grey list, officials believe, happened more due to strategic reasons rather than UAE amending its laws.
As per researchers and journalists who worked on the leaked data, they have included the names of only those individuals whose details they could verify through open source investigation and found them to be of public interest—either because of their alleged criminal pasts or political prominence.
The prominent names that cropped up were then separated into categories—convicted and alleged criminals, political figures, and people under sanctions. Those Indians who the researchers could not place under any of these categories were not included in the list.
In simple words, “Dubai Unlocked” was only able to focus on the “known names” and was not able to find out or put out the names of the Indian nationals working under the radar and who legally do not have the resources to own properties in Dubai yet they do.
Sources who track these matters say that apart from many high ranking government officials who have worked in Dubai, many small-time politicians own properties in Dubai which they have not declared in India. This is because their known source of income will not be able to justify how they were able to purchase these properties. To hide these transactions, these properties have been bought in the names of blood relatives and using the identity documents of close associates.
Officials gave the example of senior Trinamool Congress politician Shankar Adhya, who was arrested by the Directorate of Enforcement in January 2024. He owns multiple properties in Dubai, but yet his name is not in the latest “leak”, nor was it in the leak that was released a few years ago.
Similarly, another politician who is in prison for the last few months, owns at least three properties in Dubai, the details of which are not known to tax officials in India.
According to sources, bureaucrats and police officials from across India, including Jharkhand, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh, Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, Mizoram, and Union Territories (AGMUT) cadre, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka have some form of undeclared investments in Dubai but they have kept that hidden by creating multiple layers that do not link them with these properties directly.
Sources said that if the government wants, it can easily identify these officials who have bought property in Dubai by reaching out to UAE officials. This exercise, if done, will also reveal the details of the government projects for which these officials were given the kickbacks which allowed them to buy properties in Dubai.