LIC’s western zone, which has been the flagship for the Corporation from the beginning, has sold a record Rs 9,002 crore in new premium in FY18, adding 3,463,582 new customers, the life insurance giant has said. Though in percentage terms this is only 5 per cent incremental addition, this is a big boost to the Life Insurance Corporation’s overall premium collection as the western zone contributes 21 per cent of its total business followed by the eastern zone.

In FY17, the western zone had collected Rs 8,575 crore, while the previous record was in FY10 when it had sold new policies worth Rs 8,865 crore. “The western zone has created history by notching up the highest ever individual new business premium in FY18. We’ve underwritten 3,463,582 new policies worth Rs 9,002 crore in first-year premium, which is the highest by any zone since the inception of the corporation, and is at least Rs 1,500 crore more than the nearest zone,” Vipin Anand, zonal manager, west, told PTI today.

The nation’s largest financial powerhouse has eight zones, and the western zone comprising Maharashtra, Gujrat, Goa, and Daman & Diu, and is the biggest in terms of business. When asked about the performance of renewal premium business, Anand said the zone has underwritten over 1,893,913 policies worth around Rs 10,000 crore.

“Together with the new group premium of a little over Rs 19,000 crore, which beats our own target of Rs 13,200 crore, and renewal and new premium, the total premium mop-up crossed Rs 38,000 crore from the western zone,” Anand added. He said one the biggest growth drivers was the PM’s Vaya Vandana Yojna for the elderly, wherein it snapped up as much Rs 4,029 crore from 91,064 senior citizens.

The zone settled 99.16 per cent of the maturity claims, while other claim settlement stood at a higher 99.95 per cent, according to Anand.

He also attributed the good show to new products sales in the second half of the reporting year. “Jeevan Shiromani and Bima Shree are popular amongst the high-end segment as the minimum sum assured being Rs 1 crore and Rs 10 lakh, respectively, for these products, which helped the zone in scaling new heights,” he said.

Also the immediate pension product Jeevan Akshay VI contributed significantly, with over Rs 4,600 crore coming from this single product, he added. The zone was No 1 in the newly-introduced cancer cover policy as well, according to Anand.