New premium collection of life insurers grow by 6.43 percent in August

New Delhi, Sep 12 (PTI) New premium collection of life insurers grew by 6.43 percent to Rs 18,639.29 crore in August compared to the year-ago month, according to the figures released Wednesday by insurance regulator IRDAI.

Life insurance companies had collected a total premium of Rs 17,513.59 crore in August 2017.

Of all the 24 life insurance companies, state-owned LIC of India witnessed a decline of 1.94 percent in its new business premium to Rs 13,122.12 crore during the month.

The rest of the 23 private sector insurers registered a rise of 33.55 percent in their collective gross premium to Rs 5,517.17 crore during the month as against Rs 4,131.29 crore in August 2017.

SBI Life's premium collection rose by 38.45 percent to Rs 1,135.71 crore, HDFC Standard Life's by 37.75 percent to Rs 1,034.44 crore, and ICICI Prudential Life by 19.63 percent to Rs 918.99 crore.

The new business premium of Aditya Birla Sun Life Insurance increased by 104 percent to Rs 282.40 crore in August this year, Bajaj Allianz Life rose by 92.43 percent to Rs 418.17 crore, India First up by 54 percent to Rs 111.67 crore and Tata AIA Life by 87.6 percent to Rs 174.74 crore.

New premium collection of Aviva Life, however, dropped by 73.08 percent to Rs 11.73 crore, Future Generali India Life by 11.82 percent to Rs 60.22 crore, IDBI Federal Life by 7.45 percent to Rs 52.43 crore.

For Sahara Life, India data showed that the insurer earned nil new premium, a fall of 96.72 percent from Rs 0.14 crore, in the year-ago period.

On a cumulative basis, the gross new premium collection by all insurance companies rose by 6.20 percent to Rs 75,588.35 crore during April-August period of 2018-19. It was at Rs 71,173.29 crore during the same period of the previous year.

For LIC, the cumulative business from new policies fell by 0.41 percent to Rs 52,701.86 crore while the cumulative premium of the 23 private sector players saw their collective premium increase by 25.39 percent to Rs 22,886.48 crore in five months to August 2018-19.