UP’s coffers to disburse farm insurance directly

LUCKNOW: The UP government is all set to directly disburse insurance benefits to farmers and the poor from its coffers and shut out private insurance companies to cut red tape.

A proposal from the revenue board has already been sent to the CM’s office and is likely to be approved soon, despite a powerful lobby of insurance firms working overtime to stall the proposal. The proposal states insurance companies deliberately delayed or denied insurance cover of the state government to farmers and below-poverty-line (BPL) people and those who were insured were running from pillar to post to get relief, but companies remained insensitive to their concerns, said the proposal from the revenue board.

Attempt to cut red tape

‘Insurance cos denied or delayed benefits to poor on flimsy ground’

As soon the Yogi government took charge in March 2017, it renamed Samajwadi Kisan Beema Yojana (Samajwadi Farmers Insurance Scheme) to Mukhya Mantri Kisan Aur Sarvaheet Beema Yojana (MMKSBY). Initially, it was limited to farmers, but later the Yogi government expanded the security net to those earning below Rs 75,000 per annum.

Uttar Pradesh being an agriculture-based economy with highest number of farmers (11crore) and a huge BPL population, the state government launched a scheme in 2012 to provide insurance cover to farmers. Initially, the scheme provided Rs1 lakh cover to farmers, but later it was augmented to Rs 5 lakh in case of death and Rs 2.5 lakh for permanent disability, apart from treatment in empanelled hospitals up to Rs 5 lakh. The Yogi government, however, rechristened the scheme to MMKSBY in 2017, providing insurance cover to farmers by paying premium to insurance firms from its budgetary provision. Initially, the scheme was implemented by the institutional finance department, but later the revenue board supervised and implemented it. However, the revenue board was flooded with complaints from officials in the district that insurance companies were harassing farmers and the poor and denying benefits on trivial grounds, despite the state paying premium.

Speaking to the TOI, a senior official in the revenue board shared that in FY 2017, the insurance companies received 20,803 claims, but only 13,867 received insurance benefits while 6,113 were denied on flimsy ground. In FY-2018, 24,726 claims were received, but only 14,868 got relief and 8,595 people were denied or kept in tenterhooks by the insurance firms. Similarly in FY-2019, while 24,321 claimed insurance, only 11,340 received benefits and a large number of 7,804 people were denied.

While the delay and denial was done by insurance firms, BPL and farmers put the blame on the state government. “By denying insurance, companies ploughed in huge profits from the government’s social-safety scheme,” said a senior officer of the revenue board. Keeping this in mind, the state government decided to cast aside insurance firms from its flagship scheme and provide benefits through the office of district magistrates.

Talking to TOI, chairman of the Revenue Board, Deepak Trivedi, confirmed that a proposal has been sent to the chief minister office for approval and the insurance scheme would now be directly implemented by the state government.

Source: The Times of India