In law and economics, insurance is a form of risk management primarily used to hedge against the risk of a contingent, uncertain

loss. Insurance is defined as the equitable transfer of the risk of a loss, from one entity to another, in exchange for payment.
Source : Wikipedia

Data released by the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) indicates that
23 life insurers registered Rs 18,282.86 crore (US$ 4.1 billion) by writing new policies during April-June 2011.

State-owned Life Insurance Corporation (LIC) of India, collected premiums worth about Rs 13,341.97 crore (US$ 3 billion), while its private peers collected 4,940.89 crore (US$ 1.1 billion) as new first-year premium during the period.

Currently, the insurance industry, including life and non-life companies, has deployed a capital of about Rs 35,000 crore (US$ 7.8 billion) out of which Rs 26,000 crore (US$ 5.8 billion) comes from the life insurance segment. Foreign players have contributed about Rs 9,000 crore (US$ 2 billion) The General insurance industry registered 22.35 per cent growth during the first quarter (April-June) of FY12 in terms of gross written premium. Public sector player New India Assurance Ltd. grew 15.97 per cent during the first quarter of FY12 by collecting US$ 520 million through new policies.

Health Insurance, the growth in premium is expected to continue at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of around 28.5 per cent during FY12-FY14.

Hewlett-Packard (HP) owned IT services company Mphasis has acquired US-based software vendor Wyde Corporation. With this acquisition, Mphasis intends to align its applications and business process outsourcing (BPO) operations with Wydes insurance software platform Wynsure. The acquisition is the second one in insurance segment by Mphasis, which bought AIGs captive unit in India in 2009. The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has given its nod to Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL) to buy Bharti Groups 74 per cent stake in each of Bharti AXA life and general insurance companies. Bharti Enterprises and French insurer AXA Group were in 74:26 joint venture (JV). While RIL will acquire 57 per cent of the pie, Reliance Industrial Infrastructure Ltd (RIIL) will buy the remaining 17 per cent held by Bharti in the two companies. Indias second largest public sector lender Punjab National Bank (PNB) is set to form a strategic alliance with insurance firm Metlife for its proposed life insurance business, wherein the bank would buy 30 per cent stake for an undisclosed amount. PNB also agreed to enter into a 10year distribution tie-up with Metlife India. The deal is expected to close by the end of 2011. Cigna Corporation, American health insurance major, is planning to form a Joint Venture (JV) with an Indian company by August 2011 to mark its presence in the country's fast-growing health insurance sector.