Insurance in India has its history dating back till 1818

Insurance in India has its history dating back till 1818, when Oriental Life Insurance Company was started by Europeans in Kolkata to cater to the needs of European community. Pre-independent era in India saw discrimination among the life of foreigners and Indians with higher premiums being charged for the latter. It was only in the year 1870, Bombay Mutual Life Assurance Society, the first Indian insurance company covered Indian lives at normal rates.

At the dawn of the twentieth century, insurance companies started mushrooming up. In the year 1912, the Life Insurance Companies Act, and the Provident Fund Act were passed to regulate the insurance business. The Life Insurance Companies Act, 1912 made it necessary that the premium rate tables and periodical valuations of companies should be certified by an actuary. However, the disparage still existed as discrimination between Indian and foreign companies. The oldest existing insurance company in India is National Insurance Company Ltd, which was founded in 1906 and is doing business even today. The Insurance industry earlier consisted of only two state insurers: Life Insurers i.e. Life Insurance Corporation of India and General Insurers i.e. General Insurance Corporation of India.
Important milestones in the life insurance business in India are:

• 1912 – The Indian Life Assurance Companies Act enacted as the first statute to regulate the life insurance business.
• 1928 – The Indian Insurance Companies Act enacted to enable the government to collect statistical information about both life and non-life insurance businesses.
• 1938 – Earlier legislation consolidated and amended to by the Insurance Act with the objective of protecting the interests of the insuring public.
• 1956 – 245 Indian and foreign insurers and provident societies taken over by the central government and nationalized. LIC formed by an Act of Parliament, viz. LIC Act, 1956, with a capital contribution of Rs. 5 crore from the Government of India.

The General insurance business in India, on the other hand, can trace its roots to the Triton Insurance Company Ltd., the first general insurance company established in the year 1850 in Calcutta by the British.
Some of the important milestones in the general insurance business in India are:

• 1907 – The Indian Mercantile Insurance Ltd. set up, the first company to transact all classes of general insurance business.
• 1957 – General Insurance Council, a wing of the Insurance Association of India, frames a code of conduct for ensuring fair conduct and sound business practices.
• 1968 – The Insurance Act amended to regulate investments and set minimum solvency margins and the Tariff Advisory Committee set up.
• 1972 – The General Insurance Business (Nationalization) Act, 1972 nationalized the general insurance business in India with effect from 1st January 1973.

Till 1999, there were no private insurance companies in Indian insurance sector.  The Government of India, then introduced the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority Act in 1999, thereby de-regulating the insurance sector and allowing private companies into the industry.  Foreign investment was also allowed and capped at 26% holding in the Indian insurance companies.  In recent years many private players entered in the Insurance sector of India.