Budget 2021 | LIC IPO to be completed in 2021-22, says Nirmala Sitharaman

Government hopes listing will give retail investors chance to participate in wealth creation

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, center, with junior Finance Minister Anurag Thakur, center left, leave finance ministry for the parliament house to present annual federal budget, in New Delhi, on Monday, Feb. 1, 2021.

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, in her Budget speech for 2021-22, announced that two public sector banks and one general insurance firm will be disinvested this year.

The initial public offering (IPO) of LIC will be completed in 2021-22, she said.

In last year’s budget, Ms. Sitharaman had announced that the government proposed to sell a part of its holding in LIC to sell by way of an IPO.

The government hopes that the listing would bring discipline, while giving retail investors an opportunity to participate in wealth creation.

The government owns 100% stake in LIC, which was set up in 1956 and remains the country’s largest state-run insurer.

LIC increased its share of the first-year premium income in the first nine months of this fiscal to 70.52% from 66.24% recorded in 2018-19. Its assets roughly equal $433 billion (over ₹30 lakh crore).