Synopsis

In the decades following nationalization, insurance products were designed primarily for those with regular income streams I.e., those in formal employment. These were overwhelmingly persons in urban areas. The poor, working mostly in agriculture were largely overlooked by these new companies. when the ideological winds of change blew in the early 1990s the Indian government set about liberalizing its insurance market. At the beginning there were 14 life and 14 non-life insurance operating in India. India's insurance penetration (premiums as a percent of gross domestic products) in 2009 is low at 2.9 percent and ranks 54th in the world. In premium collection the records is better at 19 position collecting US$ 17 billions in 2009.The 2009 ratio of premium collected per capita (insurance density ) is 16.4. Compared with a world average of 469.6, India's insurance industry is still at a very nascent stage. The potential rural market for insurance is extensive since there are 6 Lakhs villages in India. But the number of insurance policies issued here pale in comparison to the potential. A survey carried out by the FICCI and ING Group revealed that even people belonging to the low income group were interested in saving their money for a rainy day. The rural insurance market is not thriving because of low awareness about insurance products, rural folks are still conservative, the word private has a negative connotation amongst rural folks, etc. The key to success in insurance penetration are accessibility, reasonably priced products, communications and effective after-sales service. Insurers must put in enough resources to explore the potential of the rural market. Delivery channels such as Non-governmental organizations, post-office, rural agents such as postal agents, TV cable operators, youth club

members,Doctor and school teacher would really hold the key to a successful strategy for penetrating in the rural market. The dominant providers of insurance to the poor in India are the Government promoted insurance scheme provided by the Life insurance Corporations (LIC), the postal life insurance (PLI) and the General insurance Corporations (GIC), private sector insurance companies and community based insurers such as NGO's and MFI. The ILO ( International Labour Organization ) review of insurance scheme in India shows that there are 42 life insurance and 41 non-life insurance products in the market. In 2009-10 there 13.2 million new rural policies from public companies and the corresponding figure from private companies are 6.5 lakhs. Life insurance account for 4.6 millions policies and non-life insurance for 9.2 million policies in the rural sector. The are a number of insurance policies launched by the insurance companies in the rural market such as ICICI Pru Mitr, BIMA BACHAT YOJANA, SUPER BACHAT YOJANA, RURAL GROUP LIFE INSURANCE SCHEME, KALYAN YOJANA, KURUNA YOJANA, ANMOL

SURAKSHA, JANA SURAKSHA etc.