Best Golden Visa for Indian Citizens (2026)

The India-Specific Factors

• LRS $250K/year cap:India’s Liberalised Remittance Scheme caps outbound remittance at USD 250,000 per adult per financial year. A family of two adults can remit USD 500K/year combined. This maps cleanly onto Portugal’s €200K donation route or Greece’s €250K lower tier, but requires multi-year staging for anything €500K+ unless alternative (legal) structures are used. EB-5’s $800K requires two years of LRS remittances per adult, or alternative capital-source structures.
• EB-5 backlog emerging for India:India was declared “current” in the EB-5 Visa Bulletin until mid-2023, but demand from Indian investors has accelerated post-RIA 2022. The rural-TEA set-aside (20% of annual visa allocation) is still current for India as of the May 2026 bulletin, but the unreserved-India category is starting to retrogress. Applicants planning through 2027–28 should default to rural-TEA to avoid the emerging queue.
• NRI status preserves Indian tax flexibility: Indian citizens can become Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) for tax purposes by spending less than 182 days per year in India. NRIs pay Indian tax only on Indian-source income, which pairs well with golden-visa-based Schengen residency (where minimum stay is often low enough to maintain NRI status).
• UAE cultural and geographic proximity: Dubai is a 3-hour flight from Mumbai, has a large Indian-origin population (~3.3M), Indian schools, direct rupee-AED banking, and zero personal income tax. The UAE Golden Visa at AED 2M (~USD 545K) is often the strongest first-step programme for Indian HNW seeking a non-EU Plan B.