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Bidisha Fouzdar

The individual insurance net is an option only for those with stable incomes and something to spare after meeting basic needs. How then do we protect the poorest of poor people, when a calamity like tsunami strikes?

Isaitamil stands on the rubble of what once used to be her home in Kulukuturai, a low-lying village off the seashore in the Cuddalore district of Tamil Nadu. Her hut was swept away by the tsunami that struck the coastal areas on December 26. She eats a humble meal of boiled rice given by the relief workers and wears old clothes that people have donated in abundance. Her family now lives in an overcrowded relief camp four km away. She wants to return to her home, but does not know what the family will eat if the relief rice stops coming.

Though belonging to the poorest of fisherfolk, Isaitamil and others in her family are not used to starvation. In normal times, they eat three full meals consisting of at least rice and fish; that uses up the fifty-odd rupees her husband earns as wages. Over the years, she had managed to put together some `luxury' goods — a cot and television — and sundry belongings that most households aspire to possess.

The concept of savings or insurance did not occur to her, as the family's earnings never crossed the threshold of survival.

"The individual insurance net does not reach out to the poorest, since it is an option only for those with stable income who have something to spare after meeting basic needs," says D. Krishnan, Executive Director, Public Relations, Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC). "We do have group insurance covers for the poor through NGOs like the Janashree Bima Yojana, a programme that ensures a minimum cover of Rs 20,000 and Rs 50,000 (for accidental death) for people below the poverty line. Fifty per cent of the premium is subsidised from the government's social security fund. The remaining 50 per cent is contributed by members or nodal agencies or the State Government."

The LIC is the country's largest insurance company and has received very few claims so far from the affected districts. At any rate, those affected the most — the poorest — are those clearly out of insurance cover.

Realising the extreme vulnerability of poor people in disasters, NGOs like ActionAid say that rehabilitation is an intrinsic part of relief. "Disaster assistance is not just about feeding people, but rebuilding their capacities and livelihoods to enable them to feed themselves," says Dr Unnikrishnan, who is part of ActionAid's Emergencies Team.

In Chennai, former fish seller Kripavathi from ICI Kuppam now tries to sell soap and detergent door to door. Poignantly, she carries her wares in the fishing vessel that was used till the morning of December 26 to carry fish. "We are left without a means of livelihood, since the fish stopped coming." She earns about Rs 20 a day — which is not enough to feed the five-member family living at a marriage hall turned relief camp.

For a calamity of this magnitude, it seems tragic that there are people too poor to be included even in minimum safety nets. The message to the insurance sector in the country is clear — protect the poor too!

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