Total new business premium, including pension and group business, rose to Rs 1.22 trillion in FY17, a growth of 25.8 per cent from around Rs 97,000 crore a year ago, a senior LIC official told PTI here.

Driven by sudden surge in single premium policy sales and falling interest rates, total new business premium of LIC rose 25.8 per cent to Rs 1.22 trillion in FY17 from around Rs 97,000 crore in the previous year.

However, the state-run insurance behemoth witnessed degrowth in terms of policies during the year under review.

Total new business premium, including pension and group business, rose to Rs 1.22 trillion in FY17, a growth of 25.8 per cent from around Rs 97,000 crore a year ago, a senior LIC official told PTI here.

New business on the individual basis zoomed 47 per cent to Rs 37,800 crore from Rs 25,700 crore a year ago.

New business on the individual basis jumped 122 per cent from the projected target of Rs 31,000 crore in FY17. Interestingly, target was the same for the previous fiscal too.

New business on the individual basis at LIC grew by 47 per cent to Rs 37,800 crore for the fiscal year 2016-17 from Rs 25,700 crore in the previous fiscal.

LIC had internally set a target of Rs 31,000 crore under the segment for the entire fiscal and thus the company's growth in this segment was up by 122 per cent for the fiscal year just gone by, the official said.

The company's single-premium policy under pension segment Jeevan Akshay comprises around 60 per cent of its total premium income which provides assured annual annuity in the range of 7.1 and 7.2 per cent.

"We did very well in the pension segment and falling interest rates also helped us achieve the growth," he said.

However, the company registered degrowth in terms of policies in the year under observation. LIC sold 2.01 crore policies during the fiscal 2017 from 2.05 crore during the previous financial year.

The company appointed 1.75 lakh new agents during the year (until February) and net addition stood at over 50,000. At present, the company has around 11.2 lakh agents.

The company lost around 30,000 agents in the previous fiscal.