HYDERABAD: It took three years for a widowed woman to claim insurance of Rs 32 lakh after her husband passed away in a drowning accident. The legal battle was not as easy as the woman was forced to run from pillar to post at the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (SCDRC) during these years to claim the insurance money from Reliance Life Insurance.
The fight for the insurance amount started in 2016 for 40-year-old Edla Rajeshwari, a native of Boyapalli village in Adilabad. Her life as a homemaker appeared normal until one day when her husband Edla Shanker died on September 14 2015.
By then Shanker had obtained an insurance cover by paying Rs 16,489 to Reliance Life Insurance. As Rajeshwari was the nominee, she approached the company for the claim but the company refused to pay.
The company, while refusing to pay the insurance amount, held that Shanker had life insurance policies with other insurance companies also. This, according to the company, was suppressing of facts while obtaining an insurance policy. It painted as though a company does not give insurance cover if the claimant has insurance with other companies.
However, the SCDRC while quoting a Supreme Court order held that having a different insurance scheme does not amount to suppressing of facts. “Non-disclosure of insurance as per Insurance Act, 1938 section 45 is not fraudulent,” quoted the SCDRC and held the company at fault.The commission directed the firm to pay `32 lakh along with court charges of `5,000.