Life insurers out of slump

Mumbai
Dec. 21: The Indian life insurance industry appears to be coming out of recession on the back of a 21 per cent growth in premium collections.

According to Mr S.B. Mathur, the secretary-general of the Life Insurance Council, "During October 2008 to March 2009 period the new premium collection witnessed negative growth. In this scenario, we can say that life insurance industry has come out of recession. For the April-October period, single premium policies witnessed a surge of around 42 per cent, with investors preferring non-linked policies signifying a clear trend towards traditional policies."
The total premium during first seven months of this fiscal rose to Rs 1,20,503 crore from Rs 99,310 crore in the corresponding period last year, Mr Mathur told this newspaper.

The latest data released by the Life Insurance Council, the industry body for all the life insurance companies in India, reveals that the renewal premiums increas-ed by around 24 per cent to Rs 73,952 crores, while new business premiums increased by around 18 per cent to Rs 46,551 crores on y-o-y basis.

Mr Mathur further said: "Total benefit paid to policyholders was Rs 34,021 crores, a rise of over 25 per cent as compared to Rs 27,179 crores last year. Private life insurance companies paid total benefits of Rs 6,996 crores a rise of 101 per cent from Rs 3,469 crores last year."

Source: AGE CORRESPONDENT (www.samachar.com)