By PTI

New Delhi: Private sector life insurer Reliance Life Insurance today said it is looking at expanding its operation beyond Indian shores and would apply again to the regulator in the light of fresh guidelines after April.

“We do believe that there is opportunity outside India as well and the company would be re-applying to the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) in the next fiscal,” said Reliance Life Insurance chief executive officer P Nadagopal.

Recently,IRDA asked the domestic insurance companies, whose applications for permission to open representative offices aboard are pending, to apply again in conformity with the fresh guidelines.

The new guidelines specify that the overseas representative office is an extended arm of Indian firm, hence is not allowed to contract any liability outside India.

Emphasising the need for Indian companies to be allowed to set up representative offices abroad Nadagopal said “if foreign companies are allowed to India, I see no reason why Indian companies cannot go out of the country.”

When asked about the countries in which the insurer would be interested, he said, to begin with Reliance Life Insurance will look at countries with NRIs dominance.

To start with we will be looking at gulf nations as these nations have large number of expat population, he said.