MUMBAI: The central government is in talks with UK-based global actuarial professional body, Institute and Faculty of Actuaries (IFoA), to introduce specialised actuarial course at the state-owned National Insurance Academy (NIA) in Pune from next academic session.    

It is keeping in view the huge demand of specialised actuaries the country may have in future, post hike in FDI to 49 per cent from 26 per cent in the insurance sector of the country.        

"We are trying to introduce specialised actuarial course at NIA in association with IFoA from next academic session. However, currently I can't say anything more as we are still busy devising the course material.

The only thing I can say at the moment is that it will be different from our all existing educational programmes," National Insurance Academy Director Sushobhan Sarkar told PTI.

IFoA chief executive Derek Cribb had called on the joint secretary in the union Finance Ministry, Anup Wadhwa, in New Delhi in this connection some time back. IFoA has introduced a specialised actuary course Certified Actuarial Analysts (CAA) in August last year.          

"We had recently interacted with the joint secretary Anup Wadhwa in New Delhi. In the meeting, we discussed how to meet proper actuarial requirement in the country and how the CAA will play a role in it. Wadhwa said he was very keen to promote NIA to develop the course," IFoA chief executive Derek Cribb told PTI on the sidelines of an event here.   

"We have suggested for having a 2-year post graduation diploma in actuarial science at NIA. We are sure that actuarial course may be a possibility at the institution in future as we are likely to have some tie-up with the institute in this connection in future for the same," Cribb said. The total fee for undergoing a CAA course will be 380 pounds.            

Currently, there are 260 actuaries in the country who are fully qualified and passed the all 15 exams that are required for become a full-fledged actuary. The problem is merely 20-30 people qualify out of the 9,000 who are studying the actuary course in the country, every year.            

"I do believe that India does require 1,000 full-fledged actuaries and 10,000 CAAs in days to come," Cribb said.         

Globally, 200 students are undergoing the CAA course and 150 of them are from UK alone, he said.        

The kind of job that most of the people in Indian insurance companies are doing doesn't require them to be fully qualified actuary and that's where the difference comes in, he added.           

"We are already in talks with a number of Indian universities for the CAA course, though the talks are in a very early stage at present. We are also likely to start talking to Indian Statistical Institute (ISI) for the course," IFoA director of public affairs Paul Reynolds said.        

Actuaries possess expertise in the field statistics and mathematics, and help in risk assessment and estimation of premiums for an insurance business based upon past occurences. 

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