India and the UAE are working on an agreement to allow transfer of prisoners between the two nations to serve their sentence terms in their home country.
The agreement will enable Indian convicts in the UAE to serve their sentences in their home country, and the UAE will bear their daily expenses, India's ambassador to the UAE, M K Lokesh said.
Following the signing of the agreement, a legal
department in the UAE Embassy in India will follow up on the cases of prisoners who are transferred to Indian jails.
"Convicted Indians can request to serve their jail terms in India. This is done on humanitarian grounds. The
request can be made either by the Indian or the UAE
government, or by the prisoners," Lokesh said.
However, convicted prisoners involved in financial crimes or those sentenced to death cannot serve their terms in India.
A senior official at the UAE Ministry of Interior said the agreement will be signed between the two countries soon, according to the Gulf news.
About 2,000 Indians are in UAE jails.
The UAE is considered the first Arab country to sign a prisoner-transfer agreement, which is permitted by the United Nations.
An agreement signed between the UAE and other Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries four years ago allows prisoners to serve their terms in their home countries.