'SECP to set up Sharia Board for Islamic insurance'

The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) will set up 'Central Sharia Board' for Islamic type of insurance in next three months. This was stated by SECP Chairman Raziur Rehman while talking to Business Recorder after a seminar on Takaful (Islamic insurance) at a hotel here on Wednesday.
He said that the process for setting up the board had been started, which would be completed within the next three months. This board would provide proper guidelines for Islamic insurance (takaful) in the country.
"We wanted to jointly establish the Sharia Board with State Bank of Pakistan. However, due to some reasons, it could not materialise, and now we have decided to set it up separately", he said.
The SECP Chairman said that recently two Islamic insurance companies, Pak Kuwait Takaful Limited and Takaful Pakistan Limited, had started operation in the country, while licences for five more Islamic insurance companies were in the pipeline.
Earlier, speaking at the seminar, he said that SECP was committed to provide all necessary facilities to promote Islamic insurance in the country. "The main purpose of the seminar is to gather all stakeholders to discuss the relevant issues so that we would be able to understand and solve these issues with the mutual consultation."
He said that the Islamic banking was flourishing in the country, and there was much potential for Islamic insurance here. He urged for launching Islamic insurance products in very transparent manner to build up trust over this mode of Islamic system.
"We want to discuss the main issue of Islamic re-insurance (RE-Takaful) because without it we can not get our objectives", he said. In the seminar, a separate sessions were held on 'Re-Takaful', 'Issues in Takaful', 'Window Operations' and 'Islamic banking experience: A Guideline for Takaful', in which many experts from within the country and the foreign delegates presented their papers.
A large number of professionals from the Islamic and conventional insurance industry, banking and other relevant fields attended the seminar and appreciated SECP efforts to conduct such seminar for creating awareness and to educate all stakeholders regarding different issues in this field.