The General Insurance Employees’ Association (GIEA) will seek support of the public, particularly over 30 crore policyholders, to defeat the government move to pass the Insurance Bill in Parliament, which would adversely affect the public insurance sector, a top association official said.
“The government, which introduced the Bill in Parliament in 2008, is making efforts to pass it in the winter session despite opposition from the Standing Committee, to give effect to enhanced FDI in the insurance sector and also divestment of Public Insurance companies,” G Anand, General Secretary, GIEA, South Zone,” told reporters here.
He said the zone’s three day 15th General Conference beginning here tomorrow would resolve to oppose the move, adding the Association would seek support of more than 15 lakh agents and 30 crore policyholders after creating awareness on the adverse affect of the bill, if passed, on the sector.
Anand said the four general insurance companies in India have a 58 per cent market share in the total insurance sector and if FDI is enhanced and the public companies divested, the market would shift to private sector insurance firms, “majority of which were controlled by Multi Nationals“.
Also, competition in the sector has reduced premium of public insurance companies to the tune of Rs 10,000 crore so far, Anand claimed.
The conference, to be attended by representatives from Kerala, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Puduchery, would also resolve that association members, agents and policy holders support political parties which are against the Bill, in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, Anand said
If the Bill is passed, all employees of public sector insurance companies would observe a one day strike the next day, he added.
Comments
Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.
We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of TheHindu Businessline and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.