Thank you very much. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. The first question is from the line of Rehan Saiyyed from Trinetra Asset Managers. Please go ahead.

Good afternoon. Thank you for giving us the opportunity. I assume the management has cleared points in detail with us. I would like to ask a couple of questions. First question is on the global side. Can you share more on your credit rating improvement strategy and how global rating agencies are responding towards that for going forward and what is the recent trend to the industry?

Excuse me, we are not clear what you asked. Can you repeat please?

Sure. I am asking can you share more on your credit rating improvement strategy.

Sorry to interrupt. Mr. Rehan, May I request you to use your headphone? Can you try to use the speakerphone?

Now, am I audible? Hello.

Yes, please go ahead.

So, my first question is around can you share more on your credit rating improvement strategy and how global rating agencies are responding towards that? Just put more light on that. 15I4t zeu4TiArfALs

Yes, so actually on this credit rating, we have been credit rated by AM Best for quite some time now and unfortunately in the year 2018, we were downgraded to B++ from A-Excellent and since then, we have been working consistently to see that we go up back to our A rated status and in that endeavor, we have been consistently trying to improve our ERM methods, the technology usage, the kind of resilience across all parameters, risk management initiatives, we have employment of technology to ensure that there are no gaps, all of this we have been trying to do across the last few years and most particularly in the last year, we have made some significant strides in this area. We have put certain, or wherever we have had audit observations and audit paras from our statutory auditors, we have actually put our teams, a task force to address each of these unreconciled amounts and as a result of that, you can see that the last quarter and this quarter, we have taken a few of the unreconciled amounts which are pretty old, very old balances to our P&L, we have written them off and so that we clean up the books permanently for the future. At the same time, to be future ready and to ensure that such things do not repeat, we have created certain verticals within the company to address these procedural lapses so that, because of the transactional inconsistencies and delay, these things were happening and therefore, we have put address all those gaps. We expect that this will be a total cleanup for the future and we will not see these kinds of instances in the future. Apart from that, we have strengthened our ERM team. We have completely drawn up a risk map, heat map which was there. We have improved on it. We have taken the help of one of the big three in ensuring that we get the, the absolute state of art, knowledge transfer, the best practices in the industry for addressing this, to make ERM best in class for this industry and I think there has been a significant improvement from there. We have adopted technology in a big way to ensure that these gaps which were there in the procedures and processes, they addressed to a large extent and we have seen significant improvement in the way our teams have reacted to this, the way these processes have cleaned up and brought more accountability to the table of each and every employee. The way we are able to measure TAT, when it comes to claim settlement or, in fact, even for underwriting, we are able to find out where and on which table the delay is happening and these things, I think, are something which are permanent in qualitative terms and this would bring continual rewards for this company every quarter that we go. Okay. I understand and thank you for such a detailed answer and my second and last question is around what's the output for combined ratio in second half? Any internal targets or levers to improve it? Is there any target in the management team you have forecasting for FY'26 — FY'27? Yes. So, last year, we had a phenomenal year when we brought down the combined ratio from 119 to 116, which is not a mean feat to achieve for such a big entity, a global entity. So, it was definitely something we really worked on in the last year and we brought in significant change. The same things hold good this year. Additionally, this 1st Quarter has not moved in terms of NEVI INDIA ASSURANCE combined ratio because there were a few large losses that affected this particular quarter and the one from Air India was a once in a while kind of a loss and otherwise, possibly, we could have seen a traction there also. But going forward and I think the kind of initiatives we are taking, we are very sure that internally, we have set ourselves improvement in combined ratio by another 3% this year, which I think should be achievable at the current point of time.

Okay ma'am, thank you for your answer and good luck for the coming quarter.

Thank you.

Thank you. The next question is from the line of Aditi Joshi from J.P. Morgan. Please go ahead.

Yes, thanks for taking my question. Just on the loss ratio side, just now you said that the 1st Quarter could have been better if it was not the case with the Air India losses. But if I look at the incurred loss ratio across the business line, it has broadly shot up in almost every category. So just firstly, with respect to the health insurance, actually, I wanted to understand what is your outlook for the rest of the year, especially given that we have taken some pricing hike and also cautious underwriting approach in that segment and also in the motor insurance side, now that the third-party premium hike has not come, so what is your outlook for the motor TP loss ratio as well? And if you are able to guide your total group level loss ratio for the rest of the year that will be helpful.

Yes, this quarter, as you rightly said, the fire loss ratio, I mean, 11.44 is pretty low. And I think this is a natural case when we write new risks and you have different exposures here and you can say that this quarter it has gone up, but then that is still not very alarming. When it comes to marine, it is just a 4% increase. The major ones are, I think, in health, as you rightly said, from 105 to 108 and mainly this has happened because of medical inflation, which is currently at 14%- 15% and we have been telling to all agencies across the year, that a large part of the medical insurance service that we give our policyholders is unregulated, which is the hospitals and as long as each and every hospital in each and every tier of cities does not get on to a cashless system where we are able to pre-fix or pre-determine the rates, this kind of inconsistencies is going to keep happening, even though our underwriting processes have changed over the years. We have brought in a lot of stringency. There is a committee-based approval for every group mediclaim business that is written in New India. And we peg the prices much higher based on the loss ratios that have happened and despite the competition, we either let go the businesses we are not able to demand or get the price for and when we write, we write at a sufficient increase so that we are able to absorb that level of loss ratio. But then always the hospitals, they beat us at this game and therefore, you can see that increase and I am sure that once, with a lot of concerted effort from GI councils, from all of us, from, there's a concern shown by the DFS, especially on health, because it's a service that we give to the citizens of this country and therefore, I think it's not going to be too far when the health ministry also does something about it, when we have all the hospitals regulated in the country it RI,sr3ur 27-41-iilitr41 The New India Assurance Co. Ltd

and that is the day, the golden letter day for health insurance in India and we will be surely on top of the charts to give that kind of service for our policyholders. And we have this additional regulation where we can't increase more than 10% in a year. So, our hands are tied at beyond 10%, when we cannot increase, the inflation is at 14%. We have a straight 4% differential there itself and then , this quarter, the hike is also because of an increase in infectious diseases, as you would have read in the press. Additionally, there has been a lot of regulatory change in health, which is very evolving and there are lots of circulars that keep coming throughout the year, when some of the latest ones include the inclusion of pre-existing diseases and that is also one of the reasons, and there is a new concept called robotic surgery, which is being increasingly used by our customers and this is something that has possibly not been priced for or taken into account during the pricing and because of these various reasons, our claim has shot up by 3%, which is pretty decent. Okay. So just to summarize that the pricing hike that we actually took in the last year, the impact of those hikes has largely translated into the loss ratio and now that going forward, it will largely be the function of claim frequency as well as the amount. Is my understanding correct? Yes, see this price cap of 10% came somewhere in the middle of last year, when there was a lot of hue & cry about retail premiums not being affordable by the larger public. So actually, the health, we have been, I mean, even earlier to that, we have been extremely, our increase in rates has not been on every year basis. So, we did change the rate applicable age wise, instead of band wise and that has somehow spread that kind of increase in premium across each year. But then, the retail, the premium growth has largely come from all segments, whether it's retail, GMC, government, we have increased the premiums even in government business by 20% basis, the ICR. On GMC, our prices have gone up by 14% in retail by 9%. But despite that, the claim ratio has gone up. So, which again reaffirms the fact that it is a service provider that now needs to be reamed in.

Okay, got it. And, moving to the motor insurance, given the video that did not have a motor third party hike? So how to think about the incurred claim loss ratio in that segment?

Yes, see, in motor TP, basically, it is a mandated class, we cannot refuse. So, whoever comes, we have to give them the cover. Here you can see a slight decrease because we have changed our priority in terms of the segmentation under motor wherein, we have overall, we have a private car distribution 47%, the commercial vehicles at 45% and the two wheelers at 8%. In the TP, we have a private car only of 34%, commercial vehicle exposure of around 56% and the two-wheeler at 10%. So, this is where the issue happens for the TP wherein the price has not gone up and it's not in our control either. So, there we have reengineered our workforce to try and change our portfolio mix more in the favor of private car, in the 1st Quarter, I think the response can be seen here in terms of the ICR decrease from 111% to 105%. As far as the motor OD is concerned, yes, this is mainly because of the strengthening on reserves because earlier NB INDIA ASSURANCE wi3O%-crriev411.-o*qt The New India Assurance Co. Ltd year also we had this. In TP, we have strengthened the reserves last year, that's why the ICR was at 111. This year it is normal business as usual and therefore that is also one of the reasons why it is at 105%. Now the OD thing has gone up because this is mainly because of the OEMs and the dealers who demand a huge outgo because of which we are not able to. It's a very competitive segment, a lot of, it's huge competition in this area and when we do not get the businesses that are given away at a very high commission and then this kind of impact is bound to be seen. We have done some kind of dynamic strategy for each of the geographies that we operate on which is right now a work in progress and maybe in the next quarter or quarter after that you may be able to see an improved performance on OD which needs to be monitored on a daily basis. This is something we are doing right now and I think the results will be seen a quarter later.

Okay, got it. That is helpful. Thank you. Thank you. The next question is from the line of Shobhit Sharma from HDFC Securities Limited. Please go ahead. Yes, hi. Thanks for the opportunity. So, I have a few questions around the OPEX. So, if you look at the policyholder account, there is a steep decline in the OPEX. On the other side, if you look at the shareholders account, there is a steep increase, so is there some re-categorization which has happened over there?

I will request the management officials present in the meeting to answer the questions.

The reason why the operating expenses have gone down is strictly because the employee costs have gone down. The number of employees has actually reduced and correspondingly, we also had lesser impact on account of the pension liabilities last year and the same trend continues this year. So, that has actually resulted in the operating expenses gone down.

Sorry to interrupt, sir. My question was on other OPEX. Employee remuneration, I got that. Can you help us understand around the other OPEX, please?

Yes, on the other OPEX, re-categorization-wise, we had moved some of the earlier provisions that we were making are actually getting into the revenue account. But there was a change of policy and they are now moving into the P&L account.

Okay, sir. And there is a steep increase in terms of the other income which we have recognized during the period. Is this sustainable and what does it relate to? fa RI Ifktiti,q,41•t•-fi The New India Assurance Co. Ltd

Management

This is the provision that we have created. If you are talking about the minus Rs.145 crores, the provision that we have created for the non-moving reinsurance balances and towards the doubtful debt. So, this was done with the main intention of cleaning our books. Ma'am, I am referring to the other income. It is a combination. We had another income, what you are talking about the Rs.202 crores of other income which is there. So, there is a combination of two, three things. Actually, as per our accounting policy, some of the old balances, we have taken a call of making provisions as well as so there will be non-moving balances which are appearing on both sides. Some need to be provided and some needs to be written back. So, whatever is written back has been put in the form of other income and whatever is written off is put in the form of the provisions. So, if you see the net impact is around Rs.145 crores negative.

Okay, sir. Got it. Now coming on to the business side, ma'am. Can you help us understand our approach on the long-term motor policies and how much business does this segment contribute to our top line right now?

Management

Management

Long-term motor policy, we have launched recently but as of now, the proportion is on the lower side. But going forward, if we get a right price, we will be open to doing long-term policies even on the OEM side. Okay. Ma'am, now coming on to the health side. So last time you had highlighted that on the retail health side, we have seen a 10% improvement in terms of the loss ratio and you had attributed that to the increase in the claim investigation which was around 34 odd percent for FY'25. So, can you help us with the same number for this current quarter, how are we progressing on the claim investigation, the efficiencies on the claim side and if you can split your health loss ratios in terms of retail, group health, employer-employee and the government, that would be helpful. Sir, good afternoon. As far as retail is concerned, last year we have done 30% in-house audit by our in-house doctors. The current year, the target has been fixed at 50% of audit of all the claim files of retail and also group health. So surely, we are also planning to introduce the FWA tool also, the in-house tool, even though all the TPAs got in-house tool, we are also trying to introduce. So, this year, last year ICR was 87% and slightly there is a 3% increase, mostly with respect to the infectious disease during this period. Always the 1st Quarter, there will be some increase in ICR as far as the health department is concerned. Then one more aspect is some of the big accounts where we used to pay the single premium of lump sum, so that also.

Sir, if I heard you correctly, you mentioned that, sorry ma'am. ekca 74-+ 091. as'oqt

The ICR has gone up slightly this quarter as compared to last year because of increased incidence of infectious diseases because of which there is lot more hospitalization than earlier. This is something that is beyond our control and as he explained, number of audits has gone up from 30% to 50% because we are recruiting fifty more direct recruit doctors into our force. We already have seventy-five last year. We are adding another fifty, so this also proves the amount of, we are going to drill down into this entire claim process for health. We have also, we are building right now a customized fraud, waste and abuse tool that will help us to detect which hospital charges how much for which treatment and where is the leakage. Hello, ladies and gentlemen, we have the management line disconnected. Please stay connected until I reconnect the management. We have the management line reconnected. Please go ahead. Yes, can you hear me? Yes, ma'am. Yes, as I just said, you know that now the audits have gone up, the number of the tools, the technology is being utilized. Even otherwise earlier the TPAs used to use their own tools. We also had an in-house tool that we used to use, but we are re-customizing the entire thing because I think there are so many other parameters that we feel we could monitor even more strongly and we want to see that every case as far as possible we get for 100% audit. So we are trying to move towards that and in that endeavor we are now building our own tool and we are going to see that this is wanted even more closely and I am sure that with all these efforts, because the 1st Quarter is always, the health ICR is always high, with these efforts I am sure that by the end of the year we will bring down the overall ICR for the year to a much better number than what it was last year. Okay, ma'am, is there any thought around bringing in the health claim settlement on the health side in-house? No, it is not possible with the level of the volumes that we have at the moment. So this year we will be still not having any complete in-house settlement, but we,do have TPAs, we have a government TPA that does an audit of the other TPAs. So, all these systems are there and I do not see that we are going to have any in-house TPA. It is a very big thing, it takes at least two, three years to adopt one and then especially in a PSU outfit and then make them ready to take on this kind of an initiative. It is a kind of a parallel vertical which will require investment of four, five hundred personnel present all across the country, all of that. So, it is a totally different initiative that needs to be thought about and till then we will have to see how much we can bring in efficiencies by way of technology. I think we are trying to adopt technology as a way we could even supervise the external TPAs and see that there is no leakage from their side. And there is also this parallel initiative of hospitals coming on board on the NHCA system and ‘04crr aingt

cashless being the way forward. Once that happens, this ecosystem will really improve in a much better way. Once it is cashless, everything is recorded, there is a database created wherein claims are there, fraud detection is much easier than before. So, I think the whole industry is working towards it, it is just a matter of time. Ma'am just one thing which I wanted to understand, generally we believe that the GIPSA pricing arrangement which you have with the PSU Insurance Health, it gives them a levy of around 20-25% lower claim size. Is that true or is this something else? Can you help us understand about the GIPSA arrangement? No, it is totally untrue. GIPSA is just an association that does a common communication between the DFS, owners and the other companies that are the members of GIPSA. Beyond that, there is no other great efficiency we get by being a GIPSA company. We are competitors in our own market. We, of course, are governed by the DFS who are our owners. Even here, the thing is we are deeply regulated where health is concerned. We have regular reviews on health, especially on group health wherein the loss ratios had gone bad a couple of years ago. Since then, we have been deeply regulated. Our owners are fully aware of the health insurance ecosystem, how it works. So, we are reviewed on every aspect of health insurance very strictly and therefore, we are answerable and accountable for everything we do here. So, therefore, I think we cannot take an independent call vis-a-vis the private sector that does have a lot of liberty to take many calls on many things.

Okay, ma'am. Got it. Thank you and all the best.

Thanks.

Thank you. The next question is from the line of Nitesh from Investec. Please go ahead.

Thanks for the opportunity. First question is, can you share the incurred loss ratio for the retail health segment for quarter 1?

Nitesh

Nitesh

90%. It is 90%. 90%? Yes. Okay. So, second is, in your opinion, what is the possibility of motor TP price hike this financial year? Or we should completely rule it out? fiL:),,a(3wt fcli ias

No, I mean, that is what. So, we have no clue whether it will get increased this year. Our hope and prayers are for that because in this endeavor, I think GI Council has worked a lot throughout the last year and several representations have gone. I myself have been a part of one of the meetings when we met MoRTH and we had these discussions with them. And at that point of time, we did feel that something surely would come out. If not in the same format, the pricing would definitely undergo some more segmentation and it would come. But I think right now, that is still not happening. And right now, we have no clue whether it will come out in a month's time, three months' time. No clue. Sure. And last question is that we are witnessing the now competitive intensity from other PSU entities in the motor on-damage segment and we are seeing a bit of irrational pricing. So, what is driving that? The balance sheet position of other PSUs is not that strong. So, what is actually driving this? And this will all end a bit negatively for them over medium term. But what is making them so competitive in the near term?

I will not be in a position to comment on any other organization.

Okay. Thank you. That's it for my side.

Thank you so much.

Thank you. The next question is from the line of Aditi Joshi from JPMorgan.

Thanks. I appreciate you again. Just a couple of follow-up questions. The first is on the fire insurance, the growth was pretty decent in terms of the premiums. So, just want to understand like how is the competitive intensity and the pricing environment looking? And what is the outlook going forward under the fire segment for the rest of the year? And the second, if you are able to provide your guidance on the combined ratio for FY'2026 that will be actually helpful. Thank you.

Yes. So, fire insurance has been New India's forte. We have been the leaders all along. We continue to be and we will surely be in the future also. We are the largest insurer for the large risk segment; we have been the leaders and it is always an insurer of choice for most of the large risk owners to go with New India. And so, it is no surprise that we have done so well. But apart that, the main reason for the increase is because the last year has witnessed a deep decrease in pricing in fire from the months of May to December when the pricing discounts were in the range of 90 plus. And that is the discounting when we talk about it is from the IIB pricing that was prevalent in the market before that. Now, since there is no tariff in the market, IIB pricing was something that was adopted by the market and then they decided not to go with it and therefore, it dived down. And then after that, because this is a heavily reinsurance- driven line of business and therefore the insurers had to step in and warn each one of the insurers that they would take off the reinsurance protection from 1st April. So, once they did wofkErr.uvq1.o-fr The New India Assurance Co. Ltd that, the market quickly got back into discipline from 1st Jan and started quoting better rates at least in line with the loss ratios in the segment and therefore, there was definitely when you see 80-90% discount, then obviously when you re-correct and then you see something closer to reality, you are bound to see a decent 20% growth and that is one of the reasons that the growth is at 19.95%. But apart from that, New India has acquired a couple of new clients. We are very proud about them, to have them with us. And I am sure that this growth will be there going into the future also because this is a reinsurance-driven line, as long as the insurers maintain a leash on capacity, this will continue to grow.

And on the combined ratio guidance for the year?

Yes. Combined ratio guidance, I already said that we are aspiring to have a combined ratio 3% lower than 116, which would be around 113 maybe for this year.

Okay, got it. Thank you so much.

Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen that was the last question. I now hand the conference over to Mrs. Girija Subramanian, CMD of New India Insurance Limited.

We extend our sincere gratitude to everyone who contributes to the New India Assurance, our valued investors, business partners, dedicated employees, and all who are connected to our institution, our agents, our brokers, the web aggregators, and shareholders in particular. We truly appreciate your engagement and the opportunity to share our strategies, financial performance, and future outlook. Your perspectives play a crucial role in our continuous growth and transparency. Above all, we deeply appreciate the steadfast trust our customers have placed in us for over 106 years. We are committed to building on this legacy, leading from the front, keeping our customers at the center of our existence for many more years to come. The entire management team and our dedicated workforce are united in our promise to consistently deliver on the commitments we have made to you, our valued customers. Should you have any questions or require any assistance, please do not hesitate to email us. We assure you of a swift and helpful response. I am happy to share with you that New India Assurance has been awarded the best PSU insurer in terms of grievance redressal for this year and this was a big achievement. We ended with a 99.96% grievance redressal, a show which is the best in the industry. Thank you all for being with us in this journey.