A Study on the Growth and Overview of Insurance Sector in India.

The insurance market in India has seen significant development since the period of 2000. At one time the sector was highly regulated and dominated by the public sector such as the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), but today there are 44 insurers in the country with 21 in life insurance and 22 in non-life insurance segments. 

The present research is conducted to review the growth and development of insurance sector in the country. The research is based on the available published data on the subject. There are plenty of statistical data published by IRDAI and Insurance Council and hence there was no problem of availability of data.

The findings of the research revealed that the insurance industry in India ranks 9^th in the world in Life insurance and ranks 14^th in the non-life insurance. The insurance market which was highly dominated by public sector has transformed from monopolist market to   the oligopoly type of market. Insurance penetration in India is 4 percent (3 for life & 1 for non-life) which is increasing slowly but much lower than the global standards of 6.8 per cent. The insurance density is 92 USD (70 USD for life & 20 USD for non-life) which is also significantly much lower than global benchmark of 874 USD.

In the life insurance segment LIC is the market leader with a share of 59%, followed by SBI (Life) 10% and HDFC life at 8%. In the non-life segment, New India Insurance has the highest market share of 13%.

 However, there is bright potential for the insurance market in view of the low penetration and low density of insurance in the country. The insurance sector is poised for rapid growth & development due to the favourable demographic, technological factors and economic factors such as rising disposable income, higher standard of living, higher economic growth, rapid urbanisation and so on.