Chennai, Aug 12 (IANS): The Indian life insurance industry closed July logging 14.2 per cent growth in new business, industry body Life Insurance Council said on Monday.

According to the Life Insurance Council, the industry earned new business premium of Rs.31,822.69 crore in July, up from Rs 27,867.1 crore earned during July 2023.

Driven by strong demand for enhanced insurance protection from individual consumers, new policy issuance too increased by 2.73 per cent on a year-on-year (Y-o-Y) basis in July 2024, resulting in the addition of 23,88,720 new policies vis-a-vis 23,25,235 policies sold in the year-ago period.

According to data released by the Council, the life insurance industry saw individual single premiums grow by 24.82 per cent Y-o-Y to close at Rs 4,610.66 crore for July 2024, while YTD growth stood at 17.89 per cent.

Individual non-single premiums came in at Rs 9,170.53 crore and grew by 18.72 per cent in July 2024, even as YTD collections settled at 19.55 per cent higher than the corresponding period of the previous year.

The strong performance can be ascribed to the fact that life insurers are increasingly focusing on encouraging first-time life insurance buyers to purchase essential life insurance solutions, contributing to 20.69 per cent growth in combined individual premium collections for the month of July, and 19 per cent growth on a YTD basis, the Life Insurance Council said.

In the group policy segment, single premiums grew by 9.88 per cent with monthly collections coming in at Rs 16,435.24 crore. In fact, the group policy category witnessed a 9.68 per cent growth in premiums collected in July 2024 while new policy issuances expanded by 10.51 per cent Y-o-Y.