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In the run-up to the introduction of the Insurance Bill in the Winter Session of Parliament, the Select Committee will meet on Wednesday to deliberate over the long pending legislation which seeks to raise the foreign direct investment (FDI) limit from 26 per cent to 49 per cent.
In August, bowing to Opposition pressure, the BJP-led NDA Government had agreed to refer the Insurance Bill to a 15-member panel.
FDI limitThe Bill, which proposes to hike the FDI limit in the insurance sector to 49 per cent, has been caught in a logjam with the Congress-led opposition insisting that it be referred to a select committee. According to sources, the meeting will have a “clause by clause” discussion of the various provisions of the Bill to assuage the concerns of the Congress so that it has a smooth passage in the Winter Session set to begin on November 24.
Industry officials said the Congress has indicated that it will support the Bill if the Government agrees to drop amendments proposed to the earlier Bill, which was introduced during the Congress regime.
Scope of foreign investmentApart from technical changes, the amendment proposed to the Insurance Bill by the BJP Government includes a clause which seeks to explicitly enlarge the definition of ‘foreign investment’ to include foreign institutional investors.
The Select Committee has held a series of meetings with different stakeholders, including insurance industry officials, and senior officials from the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority.
The Select Committee is chaired by Chandan Mitra from the BJP, and its members include: Anand Sharma, BK Hariprasad, and JD Seelam (Congress); Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi and Jagat Prakash Nadda (BJP); Satish Chandra Misra (BSP); KC Tyagi (JD-U); Derek O’Brien (TMC); V Maitreyan (AIADMK); Naresh Gujral (SAD); Ram Gopal Yadav (SP); Kalpataru Das (BJD); P Rajiv (CPI-M); and Rajiv Chandrasekhar (Independent).
The committee is expected to submit its final report to the Government in the third week of November, ahead of the Winter Session.
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