Abu Dhabi: The top diplomat at the UAE Consulate General in the southern Indian state of Kerala submitted his credentials to the state government on Tuesday.
Jamal Hussain Al Zaabi submitted his credentials as the Consul-General at the Consulate at Thiruvananthapuram, to Pinarayi Vijayan, the Chief Minister of Kerala.
Vijayan welcomed the UAE’s gesture to officially open the consulate very soon. He congratulated the UAE Consul-General on his new post and wished him success in his duties.
The two officials discussed bilateral relations and ways of boosting them in economic and investment sectors.
“I am happy to take up this important assignment,” Al Zaabi told Gulf News on phone from Thiruvananthapuram on Wednesday. He said the construction of the Consulate General office has almost been completed and it will be officially opened soon. However, the opening date has not been decided yet. Al Zaabi said he has started working at the new office.
T.P. Seetharam, Indian Ambassador to the UAE, told Gulf News: “The new UAE Consulate General in Kerala will play an important role in further strengthening all aspects of the historical, close and dynamic relations between UAE and the southern part of India. I am happy to learn that the UAE Consul General has taken up his assignment in Thiruvananthapuram.”
The new consulate is expected to be the UAE’s busiest diplomatic mission in India, given the fact that an estimated more than one million Keralites are working in the UAE. People from two other Indian states — Tamil Nadu and Karnataka — can also easily access the new consulate, which is the UAE’s third diplomatic mission in India, after the embassy in New Delhi and the consulate in Mumbai.
Al Zaabi had earlier said that he was hopeful about the prospect of further strengthening cultural ties between India and the UAE. The senior diplomat was serving as the first secretary at the UAE Embassy in Hanoi in Vietnam.
The UAE expressed its plan to open a consulate in Kerala in 2011, following a request from the Indian government and initiated by the Government of Kerala.
