Page 39 - Insurance Times September 2015 SAMPLE

The Chief Minister of Maharashtra spoke on the growing He applauded the government initiative to launch 3 social
economy of the country and the role of Banking , Finance security schemes "Pradhan Mantri Suraksha Bima Yojana"
& Insurance Sector. He compared the Insurance (accident insurance), "Pradhan Mantri Jeevan Jyoti Yojana"
penetration of the country to the international benchmark (life insurance) and "Atal Pension Yojana". The government
and said the insurance penetration is still quite low in India. hopes to bring around 40% of the population by these
He added that the country has a demographic advantage insurance cover. The Vice President said that the main
as majority of population is below 25 years of age and so challenge is to encourage the poor household to invest in
the young force can help in improving this penetration. The insurance for social protection. He also emphasised on the
Chief Minister also said that Maharashtra is the 1st state fact that the industry needs to employ emerging technology
in the country to conduct a pilot project to insure each and move beyond traditional products. Lastly he said that
farmer of the 500 villages. He congratulated the institute the Insurance Institute of India will play an important role
and extended warm wishes to the institute with a hope of in this endeavour and wished them a great future.
growing larger in the coming future.
Vote of Thanks for the session was proposed by Mr. P.
The Hon`able Vice President stressed on the fact that the Venugopal, Secretary General, Insurance Institute of India.
Government`s prime objective is to make sure that the He whole heartedly thanked the dignitaries who graced the
poorest should have insurance by enabling all the available occasion of concluding the Diamond Jubilee Celebration of
resources to them. He said due to increased competition the Insurance Institute in a manner that will be etched in
there will be more product innovation which will benefit the the memory of everyone present there as well as everyone
consumer. According to him the Insurance to GDP ratio in associated with the institute. The session came to an end
our country is 3.96% compared to China which has around with the National Anthem.
3% but much below the world average of 6.3%. He added
that the 2/3rd population in India are dependent on The fag end of the day was celebrated by felicitation of Ex-
agriculture and agriculture consists of 17% of the GDP but employees of Insurance Institute of India, almost all of
the problem lies with the design and delivery of crop whom had put in their whole life working for the institute
insurance. and taking it to new heights.

According to him the task is formidable but not impossible. Finally the closure of the day was marked by a Cultural
He stressed that if the African countries can do it Programme organised by the Institute which was enjoyed
successfully then we should also be able to achieve that. by all the participants.

LIC purchases 90% of Indian Oil's shares on offer

Life Insurance Corp of India has purchased nearly 90 percent of Indian Oil shares sold by the government in its Rs
9,379-crore disinvestment. LIC's stake in the state-run oil marketing firm has gone up from 2.52 percent to 11.11
percent following its participation in India Oil Corporation (IOC) offer for sale. The insurer bought as many as 20.87
crore shares or 8.59 percent of IOC, according to a filing by LIC.

The government had recently announced that its biggest disinvestment of the fiscal was subscribed 1.18 times. IOC
listed "OFS and Open Market" as the mode of LIC's acquisition done on August 24. The government had offered 24.28
crore shares for sale through the OFS whose floor or minimum bid price was set at Rs 387 apiece. While overall, the
issue was subscribed by 1.18 times the retail investors picked up less than one-fifth of their quota on a day when
global meltdown wiped away a massive 1,624 points or nearly 6 percent from the benchmark BSE Sensex.

IOC shares dipped to Rs 378 as against the auction floor price of Rs 387. Disinvestment Secretary Aradhana Johri had
termed the sale as highly successful given the market conditions and said with this the government has managed
the best-ever first half disinvestment collections in seven years. Together with three other disinvestments since
April, the government has mopped up over Rs 12,600 crore, or a little less than one-fifth of the yearly target of
Rs 69,500 crore.

The Insurance Times, September 2015 35

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