India’s life insurance industry reported a 22% year-on-year growth in new business premiums (NBP) in January, marking the third consecutive month of over 20% growth, aided by lower premiums following the goods and services tax (GST) rate reduction.
Data released by the Life Insurance Council showed that total first-year premium income rose 22% year-on-year to ₹37,478.35 crore in January, compared with ₹30,825.17 crore in the same month last year. This comes after the industry’s best-ever monthly performance in December, when NBP growth surged nearly 40% to ₹42,150.77 crore.
LIC leads the expansion
State-owned Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) led the expansion, reporting a 25% year-on-year increase in new business premiums to ₹20,441 crore during the month. Private life insurers, as a group, recorded a 17% rise in premiums to ₹17,037 crore in January.
Among major private players, SBI Life Insurance, the largest private insurer by premium, posted an 8% year-on-year increase in January premiums to ₹3,533.76 crore. HDFC Life Insurance, however, saw a 3% decline in premiums to ₹2,924 crore, while ICICI Prudential Life Insurance reported a 12% increase to ₹1,990 crore.
2.8 million policies sold in January
Life insurers sold a total of 2.8 million policies in January, compared with 2.54 million policies in the same month last year.
On a cumulative basis, life insurers recorded a 14% rise in new business premiums during the April–January period of the current financial year, with total premiums reaching ₹3.38 lakh crore. LIC also reported similar growth, with cumulative premiums rising to ₹1.98 lakh crore.