Insurance cos should pentrate to grassroot level: MoS Finance

New Delhi, Nov 1 (UNI) To make insurance penetrate to the grass root of the country, Minister of State for Finance Pawan Kumar Bansal today urged insurance companies to spread awareness among the poor, particularly regarding health insurance; even as the government acts as a facilitator.

''Insurance companies should voluntarily come forward, reach out to the poor and motivate them to take it up,'' he told the gathering at an international conference on ''Micro Health Insurance'' here.

He added that the government sees its role as a facilitator of a social change regarding the spread of awareness on insurance.

Saying that ''work of a salesman begins when the customer says no'' to a product, the minister asked the insurance providers to make people know about the kinds of schemes that are available.

To this end, he said, agencies working in rural areas can play a significant role.

In order to make health insurance more affordable, he suggested that a family should be considered as a unit instead of an individual being entitied to insurance.

''This would reduce the per head cost of premium'', he said.

''A lot of savings on the part of health care expenditure can be attained if we can raise health standards in the country,'' Mr Bansal added.

During the conference, Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority (IRDA) Chairman C S Rao said that the insurance penetration in the country has increased from 1.9 per cent in the beginning, when the country adopted the insurance regime, to 3.2 per cent now.

According to a FICCI survey on insurance, more than half of the households at the ''bottom of the pyramid'' spend more than Rs 2,400 per year on healthcare.

''When aggrgated, this adds up to a huge amount. If only a fraction of it were pooled through insurace, households would enjoy better finacial protetion, and insurers could run a sustainable business,'' FICCI Secretary General Amit Mitra said.

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