IRDA forms committee to consider sub-broking in rural areas

Moneycontrol Bureau

In a bid to expand presence in semi urban and rural areas Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) decided to consider the introduction of sub-broking system in the insurance market. It formed a 11 member committee to examine the matters in this regard.

"The issue of sub broking is under consideration of the Authority for quite some time," the insurance regulator said in an order note.

"In order to increase the penetration of insurance in semi urban and rural areas presence of intermediaries is very vital. After considerable deliberations on the issue of sub-broking, it has been decided to constitute a committee with the following members to examine various issues relating to sub-broking and submit their report to the Authority for consideration."

Those committee members included P C James, chair professor, National Insurance Academy; Sanath Kumar, GM, New India Assurance; Mukesh Kumar, HDFC Ergo General insurance; Malay Ghosh, ED, Reliance Life Insurance; Anamika Rastravar, Bajaj General Insurance; Ramesh Vishwanathan, senior VP, ICICI Prudential Life; Sohanlal Dadel, president, IBAI; Sanjay Kedia, director, IBAI; Fali Poncha, member, IBAI; Suresh Mathur, senior JD, IRDA; Satish Hegde, OSD, IRDA. 

So far, insurers and brokers are mainly operating in big cities to sell products. Earlier, India's ranking slipped from number 11 in 2010 to 15 in 2011 in the world insurance market. It was due to a sharp drop in life insurance business in 2011-12. Consequently, total insurance premium too diminished. Country's share of the world insurance market has declined from 1.8% in 2010 to 1.58% in 2011.

The newly constructed committee apparently has a three-pronged mandate to consider: 1) the introduction of a retail broking in the insurance space in the country; 2) the qualifications, examination and syllabus and the licensing system, which should be introduced for the actors in a retail broking system and 3) the manner in which the retail broking system could operate as sub-brokers.

saikat.das@network18online.com