Prime Minister Narendra Modi is scheduled to travel to the United Arab Emirates at the beginning of 2022 to attend the Dubai Expo 2020, where the Indian pavilion has been a grand success. This could be his first visit abroad in the new year.

Titled “A sustainable future for the planet”, India’s massive four-floor pavilion promises to captivate visitors with a mix of Ayurveda, yoga, space programmes, and its fast-growing USD 2.5 trillion economy.

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PM Modi will travel to Dubai and visit the expo to support the increased India-UAE trade and business engagements that span across all spheres from goods to technology, to artificial intelligence, space, etc. Apart from his visit to Dubai Expo 2020, Modi will engage the UAE leadership in high-level bilateral exchanges.

A 360-degree digital recreation of India’s past, present, and future has been developed at the India pavilion, which was inaugurated by Union Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal.

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There have been high-level ministerial visits to the expo with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, Civil Aviation Minister Hardeep Puri, and Minister of State for External Affairs V Muraleedharan exploring the event.

“This is the first time a world expo has been organised in our region,” UAE envoy to India Ambassador Ahmed Albanna had said during a press conference. The UAE was among four countries that had bid for the event. The others were Thailand (Bangkok), Brazil (São Paulo), Turkey (Istanbul), Russia (Yekaterinburg).

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The event organisers also plan on facilitating the travel of students from universities and schools within the UAE and outside. “We are expecting more than 2,00,000 students to visit the expo,” said the UAE ambassador.

Major events are scheduled in January around the time when Prime Minister Modi will be there.