If you are an Indian and living UAE or anywhere in the whole world then there is a good news for you. Government of India has increased the scope of ICWF (Indian Community Welfare Fund) to cover more welfare activities & consular services if the needs be.

This offer stands valid for all Indian’s living in UAE with a proper UAE VISA status. The community in the UAE now stands to get more benefits from a community welfare fund after their government expanded its scope.

The Union Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week, approved the revision of guidelines of the Indian Community Welfare Fund (ICWF) that aids overseas Indians in distress.

The expanded scope of the fund is also expected to offer greater flexibility in swiftly addressing requests for assistance by overseas Indians.

Set up in 2009 to assist overseas Indians in times of distress and emergency in the most deserving cases on a “means tested basis,” the ICWF will now cover “community welfare activities and improvement of consular services.”

Until now, the scope of ICWF was restricted to assisting distressed Indians in cases like repatriation of distressed workers and housemaids, sending back mortal remains, aiding workers who get stuck in the UAE for their daily needs and providing initial legal counseling in deserving cases. In the UAE, it is also used for running the Indian Workers Resource Centre.

Apart from assisting Indian nationals in distress abroad, ICWF has been a critical support in emergency evacuation of Indians in conflict zones in Libya, Iraq, Yemen, South Sudan and other challenging situations like assistance extended to undocumented Indian workers in Saudi Arabia during the Nitaqat drive in 2013 and the ongoing amnesty drive in 2017. The Indian government had allocated a portion of the ICWF fund from the UAE for some of these missions.

In 2012, the then Minister of Overseas Indian Affairs Vayalar Ravi had also allowed the Indian missions in the UAE to utilize the excess amount available with the ICWF for setting up a crematorium and two community centers in the UAE.