EFU Life
 |
|
| Industry | Life insurance |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1932 |
| Headquarters | Karachi, Pakistan |
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Key people
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Rafique R. Bhimjee - Chairman, Taher G. Sachak - Managing Director |
| Products | Unit-Linked, Conventional and Group Products |
| Website | www.efulife.com |
EFU Life, originally Eastern Federal Union Insurance Company Limited, is a Pakistan-based life insurance company. It was the first insurance company in India founded in 1932 owned by the Muslims based in Calcutta. After the independence of Pakistan in 1947 the company moved to Pakistan and operated in East and West Pakistan. The company ceased to exist in East Pakistan after it became Bangladesh. Pakistan subsequently reorganized the company to EFU Life Assurance Ltd.
It was the first insurance company in India owned and run by Muslims targeted for the Muslim populace. Abdur Rahman Siddiqui of Surat and Khonkar Fazle Haider of Murshidabad district were the company's founders. Siddiqui and Haider executed a “memorandum of understanding” in 1931 with one of leading British insurance companies, the “Atlas” and Messrs. B.M. Collins, Lloyds brokers. The company was incorporated on 2 September 1932 in Calcutta with E.N. Menhinick, a senior manager of Atlas as the first chief executive officer of the company. The main objective of the company was to provide “insurance service to the community and also to produce competent Muslim insurance personnel.”Aga Khan III and Hamidullah Khan (last Nawab of Bhopal) became the “Patrons” of the new company. Malik Ghulam Muhammad helped to arrange substantial subscriptions from the State of Hyderabad and State and Bhopal. Sir Victor Sassoon became the largest foreign shareholder and Mirza Ahmad Ispahani bought most of the shares of the EFU.
The company officially started as a general insurance company. In 1936, life business of the company started with a paid-for business of about Rs. 5.0 million. By 1946 the company started to move ahead steadily but major upheaval of the century had occurred, in which Muslims all over the sub-continent sustained immense loss, both of life and property after creation of Pakistan. The EFU management transferred its registered office to Chittagong, East Pakistan before the independence of Pakistan in 1947. The company completed a new Life Business of Rs. 4.5 million by 1947 and during 1948 transacted a total business of Rs. 13.9 million.
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