“The other five insurance companies have paid about 90% of mid-season and local disaster claims. State Chief Statistical Officer (Agriculture) Vinaykumar Awate said, Reliance has not even completed the claim calculation process.
RGICL, which covers 10 districts of Maharashtra under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY), in its correspondence with the State Commissioner (Agriculture) had stated that “the claims of Kharif 2021 and Kharif 2020 before the settlement of Rabi 2020 and Rabi 2020″ There are constraints in the disbursement of claims”.
In a letter to the central government, Maharashtra Agriculture Commissioner Dheeraj Kumar said, “The claim percentage to premium payment ratio is the lowest for Reliance at 25.55 per cent among all the six insurance companies.”
In comparison, Oriental Insurance has a payout ratio of 163%, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance at 148%, IFFCO-Tikoo 39%, HDFC-Ergo 42% and Bharti AXA General Insurance 45%.
“This shows that Reliance General Insurance Company is deliberately evading payment to farmers on one pretext or other, deliberately suppressing losses to avoid payment to farmers, and purely to malign the name of PMFBY is resorting to unethical and corrupt practices and denying the benefits of the scheme to farmers,” alleged Kumar in a letter dated November 1.
RGICL claimed that as per the operational guidelines issued by the Centre, it is required to release the applicable premium subsidy to meet the deficit under its three-year contract of implementing PMFBY with the Maharashtra government.
“Due to non-receipt of payment, the commitment of RGICL to the reinsurers and subsequent claim recovery has been affected. RGICL has earlier settled claims in proportion to the premium received under the PMFBY scheme,” it said in an email reply to ET.
The company said in several communications it has requested the state to “release the long-pending subsidy so that it can meet the farmer’s claims expeditiously with due support from its reinsurers”.
Maharashtra, in its letter to the Centre, has claimed that RGICL has made a huge profit of about Rs 2,285.46 crore under the crop insurance scheme in the state in the last five years.
Meanwhile, settlement of claims for the 2020 Kharif and Rabi season is partially pending with the insurance companies, saying they can settle the claims of only those farmers who had reported within the stipulated time frame.
The state government said that most of the farmers could not give timely information last year due to restrictions to contain the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Despite having a similar rainfall pattern in 2019 and 2021, the number of claim notifications in 2020 was only 512,061. Whereas, the number of information raised in the Kharif season of 2019 and 2021 was 5,446,771 and 3,843,147 respectively.
“This was mainly due to the COVID restrictions,” the state said in its letter to the Centre. “The toll-free numbers of the insurance companies were not working, nor did they inform the farmers about information through app or portal, which was the prime responsibility of the newly incorporated companies including RGICL,” it said.
The state said, “The matter (of the pending subsidy of Kharif and Rabi 2020) is still pending for resolution before the State Grievance Redressal Committee, and RGCIL is planning to use it to reduce the payment of damages to farmers for Kharif 2021. is on the wrong side of the guidelines,” the state said. in the latter.
“Farmers participating in RGICL Bima Yojana in 2021 Kharif season are different than those participating in 2020 season. Hence it would be unfair to the farmers of the current season to link the claim payment of the current year with the premium release of the previous year,” Awte said.
The Agriculture Department in its letter to the Center has alleged that RGICL only creates awareness to enroll farmers in the scheme. Once a farmer has deposited his premium, no publicity or awareness campaign is conducted to inform the farmers about how to register, register complaints. How is the loss percentage calculated, etc., it said.
The state said that as per the guidelines, filing of information for claims by insured farmers or designated agencies is not required for losses due to widespread calamities. It alleged, “With an intention only to save money and cheat the farmers, all insurance companies including RGICL deliberately avoided following this guideline.”
The state government in the letter also alleged that Reliance General Insurance Company has violated several operational guidelines such as not setting up offices at block level, creating awareness among farmers etc.