Dry eye is defined as the disorder of the tear film either due to tear deficiency or excessive evaporation which causes damage to the inter-palpebral ocular surface which comprises of the entire epithelial surface of the cornea, limbus and conjunctiva. Dry eye disease (DED) affects 4.3-16% of adults approximately. There are various etiological factors associated with dry eye disease and diabetes mellitus is one of them. A case control study of 100 diabetic and 100 non diabetic patients was conducted at a tertiary care eye hospital to see the correlation with duration of diabetes. The mean duration of diabetes was 8.48±4.29 years. The mean fasting and post prandial blood sugar level in study group were 155.77±14.94 mg% and 263.77±51.49 mg% respectively. The difference of blood sugar level from control was statistically significant (p<0.001). The TBUT, marginal tear strip staining, fluorescein staining, rose Bengal staining were found statistically significant in study group. 35 cases had moderate dry eye in diabetic group. The comparison of both the group was statistically significant. The severity of dry eye was statistically significant in > 10 years duration of diabetes. A total of 11% patients with >10 years duration were having severe dry eye as compared to only 2% of <10 years of diabetes. The difference between the incidence of dry eye in right and left eye was insignificant.