Agents want government to drop insurance bill

Regional-level meet of life insurance agents held in city

He was delivering keynote address at the regional-level meet of LIAFI organised at NIE Sports Complex here on Sunday.

Stating that there are 14 lakh insurance agents in the country, Srinivasachari said the bill proposes to deny commission to the family of the agent, in the event of his death. As an agent neither receives a fixed salary or pension, implementing such a move wouldn’t be beneficial for agents, he added.

He said: “The government should increase gratuity for agents to Rs 10 lakh from the existing Rs two lakh. The management is positively thinking of enhancing gratuity, but the finance ministry should also consider this.”

Addressing the concern of the agents, MP Adagur H Vishwanath called upon the agents to educate people about the importance of insurance. Observing that there was lack of awareness among people about insurance.

“We haven’t understood that insurance is for risk. But developed countries have insurance for everything,” he added.

He said 14 lakh insurance agents have contributed to improving the infrastructure in the country as they were responsible for generation of Rs 5 lakh crore. Insurance agents were involved in transaction of Rs 12 lakh crore. Insurance agents have to be taken seriously by the government, he added.

More than 500 agents from Mysore, Mandya, Hassan, Kodagu and Chamarajanagar districts participated in the regional-level meet.

MP R Dhruvanarayan, Mysore Cooperative Union president H V Rajeev, LIAFI Mysore division president C Swamigowda, LIC senior divisional officer V K Alexander, LIC marketing manager A D Jakkananavar, LIAFI general secretary south zone R S Ramanujam, Karnataka state chief C G Lokendra, H B Bandigowda, M C Sundar and others were present.