Dubai: Secularly Religious

Dubai is one of the most diversified cities in the world in terms of demographics and the religious beliefs of its residents. Although the official religion of the country is Islam like all the other countries of the region, but as Dubai is a cosmopolitan, it therefore, has a large number of expatriates living in it and all of them come from various religions. Some of them are from the Middle East and other parts of the Arab world who are chiefly Muslims while a large number of Muslims form Pakistan, Oman, India, Bangladesh and Indonesia also comes to Dubai either for business or for the sake of seeking jobs.

But at the same time a very large number of people from India are Hindus, while Sri Lankans are mostly Buddhists. The expats coming from Europe and Africa are primarily Christians and the Sikh community from India also forms a large community in the state. All these people make Dubai a multi-religion state which has taken every religious community into its laps.

It is quite an interesting fact that with all this ethnic and religious communities living in one same city, there never occurred a religious conflict among the residents. It has been possible only because the government has kept a strict check on the matters and though the government has guarded the right of every community to exercise its religious rituals, it has never allowed anyone to publish or distribute any sort of hate content against any religious group. They have made strict laws in this regard and any move to malign any religious community can lead to criminal persecution and the punishments begotten by it.

The strong hold of the government has provided an environment of general peace and harmony and this has been the main reason why business activities have flourished in Dubai because terrorism or violence of any kind in a country can be counter-productive for business activities. Dubai offers a appealing night life and beach parties are a regular phenomenon in Dubai, yet there has never been a problem with the religious clergy of the society as it is in many Muslim countries and thus the Dubai property market has prospered by leaps and bounds as business and tourist activities are at their peak in this city.