A district consumer commission recently directed the Oriental Insurance Company Ltd in five different cases to give each complainant Rs1 lakh insurance it had rejected. The amount is to be paid within 45 days, failing which it will have to be paid with 9% interest per annum. The commission further directed Rs25,000 compensation for mental agony and litigation cost to each of them.
The five orders, passed on Aug 28-29 (uploaded on Nov 21) were passed by South Mumbai District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission President Sneha Mhatre and Member DS Paradkar. The order was passed on complaints by Suvarna Patil, Alka Jadhav, Shakuntala Shinde, Shaidabi Deshmukh and Mangal Bandal.
The orders were passed against Oriental Insurance Company Limited. Though the Government of Maharashtra’s Department of Agriculture, Animal Husbandry Dairy Development and Fishery Department were second parties, there was no order passed against them.
The five had complained that their relatives had died due to accidents and their claims were rejected. They died when they were riding or sitting pillions in different vehicles, including a two-wheeler and a tractor. All were farmers at the time of the accident and had taken farmers’ accident policy.
They had filed their claims through the Taluka Agriculture Officer. Oriental stated that at the time of accident, there was no valid driving license and hence there is no deficiency in rejecting the claim of the complainant.
The complainants stated that as per the FIRs, spot panchnama, inquest panchnama, post-mortem report and police report, the accident happened either because the bike they were riding slipped, the tractor overturned or they were hit, and that the deceased were not at fault.
The commission stated that the death happened during the policy and since the policy is farmers’ accident policy, keeping the wellness of the society in mind, it is the job of the insurance company to have a district officer who looks into the details of the documents.
