Insurance Awareness Committee (IAC-Life) Applauds Bima Gram API; Acknowledges Its Potential in Strengthening Rural Insurance Coverage

The Insurance Awareness Committee (IAC-Life) is banking on Bima Gram API to change the face of rural insurance penetration. Launched recently by the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI), Bima Gram API is a pioneering digital initiative designed to streamline and authenticate insurance coverage data in rural India.

Developed by the National Informatics Centre (NIC) in collaboration with the Ministry of Panchayati Raj (MoPR), Department of Posts represented by the Centre of Excellence in Postal Technology (CEPT), and the Insurance Information Bureau of India (IIBI), the intervention comprises of a database and an API (Application Programming Interface). The Bima Gram API maps postal PIN codes to Local Government Directory (LGD) codes, creating a unified, verifiable database for rural identification. Through the Bima Gram API, insurers can now simply enter a customer’s postal PIN code to retrieve the corresponding Gram Panchayat (GP) name, ensuring instant digital verification of the policy’s rural location.

To accelerate insurance penetration in India’s rural geographies, the IRDAI has issued Rural and Social (RuSo) mandates to India’s insurers. Under the same, insurers have to cover a minimum percentage of lives, dwellings, shops, and vehicles in identified GPs and the social sector. However, over the years, insurers were finding it challenging to accurately map insurance coverage to rural areas. Most identification documents do not mention the GP name, making it difficult for insurers to accurately measure the level of insurance penetration in rural communities. This has led to cumbersome manual verification processes.

The Bima Gram API provides insurers with real-time certification and verification of rural insurance data from a trusted government source. It ensures that insurance policies emanating from rural geographies can be digitally validated, and accurately mapped with their respective GPs. Apart from reducing manual documentation, it also enhances the accuracy, speed, and efficiency of rural business reporting.

Speaking on the launch, Member, Insurance Awareness Committee (IAC-Life), said,

The launch of Bima Gram API marks a pivotal step in advancing rural insurance inclusion, and deepening and measuring insurance penetration in rural areas. Beyond helping insurers evaluate their rural penetration efforts, the API will enable us to build comprehensive baseline datasets for future policy planning and resource allocation. Bima Gram API is bound to herald a revolution in India’s life insurance history by ensuring that every rural household is served and accounted for in India’s financial safety net.

The initiative has already undergone successful pilot testing with five insurers—including two life, two general, and one health insurance company—who have integrated, tested, and verified the functionality of the API. Full industry integration is expected to be completed soon.

About Insurance Awareness Committee–Life Insurance:

87% of India continues to grapple with a significant life insurance protection gap, which continues to increase, exceeding 90% amongst those aged 18–35. This growing vulnerability is a threat to families’ financial security and aspirations.

Addressing this challenge on a war footing is crucial to maintaining our society’s socio-economic resilience and security. The Insurance Awareness Committee was formed under the aegis of the Life Insurance Council to take action on this issue.

Formed in 2019, 24 Life Insurance firms have come together to contribute under the guidance of six CEOs nominated to lead the agenda. Further comprised of a cross-industry marketing team supported by creative/media agencies, the Insurance Awareness Committee researches, plans, creates, and deploys nationwide campaigns that drive awareness, understanding, and consideration of life insurance products.

The Rising Frequency of Extreme Weather Events Underline the Need for Carbon Emission Control: Curtailing the Use of Liquid Fuels in Transport Must Be a Top Policy Priority

• With the latest hike in petrol and diesel price in Delhi, this is the right time to make a switch towards the cleaner fuel
• Extreme weather events have become increasingly frequent in recent times
• India had the dubious distinction of suffering the highest loss of lives in a single climate change-driven event last year
• This came out in an international report titled Counting the cost 2020: A year of climate breakdown that was published in December 2020
• Switching to auto LPG from existing liquid fuels is one potent way to deal with vehicular pollution, a principal contributor to climate change
• In addition to scrappage policy and Green tax, there is an instant need to ensure mass conversion of private vehicles suitable for cleaner and cheaper gaseous fuels such as auto LPG

New Delhi, 11th August 2021: With extreme weather events becoming more frequent the world over, including in India, the urgency to address climate change issues and global warming has never been greater. India in particular has been at the receiving end of these recurring extreme weather conditions. From unexpected and untimely torrential rains to floods to landslides to cyclones, the country has been continually ravaged by a spate of extreme weather events in recent times. Now with the onset of the unlock phases post-second Covid wave and the consequent return of private vehicles back on Indian roads, vehicular pollution, one major contributor to climate change is set to not only test people’s breathing organs but also further upset the already faltering weather cycles in the country. One of the ways to stem this vehicular pollution known for a heavy carbon footprint is to curtail the traditional liquid fuels of petrol and diesel and opt for cleaner alternatives such as auto LPG. Even the newly appointed Cabinet Minister for Petroleum, Mr. Hardeep Singh Puri would have a goal to address the pressing issue of air pollution in the urban areas, making sufficient use of cleaner energy to fight severe weather conditions.

With Delhi in the north, registering record temperatures and rainfall, to Bengal and Odisha suffering devastating cyclones and calamitous floods in the east in Assam, to Maharashtra witnessing both record-breaking droughts and floods in the west, to Hyderabad experiencing record rainfall in 24 hours, and Kerala enduring deadly landslides in the south, there is no part of this country which has been immune to these extreme weather events.

Alarmed by these recurring extreme weather events, Indian Auto LPG Coalition or IAC, the apex body of Auto LPG stakeholders in India has drawn the government’s attention towards the issue suggesting that the mass adoption of auto LPG replacing existing liquid fuels, to be one potent countermeasure towards controlling carbon emissions and thereby moderating the extreme weather phenomena.

“Extreme situations demand extreme and instant measures. With extreme weather conditions becoming an everyday reality impacting millions of Indians regularly now, we must hold the bull by its horns. And a part of the solution lies in addressing the vehicular pollution part of climate change with utmost urgency. For years, the liquid fuels of petrol and diesel have caused immense damage to health and the environment. At a time when cleaner and cheaper alternatives such as auto LPG are readily available, the policy persistence with petrol and diesel is simply inexplicable.

Further, the policy optimism on electric vehicles, something which is technologically and financially still decades away – is misplaced and premature. With the most recent emission tests confirming that the tailpipe emissions from auto LPG are even lesser than BS-VI compliant petrol, the government should not waste any time in giving a policy push to mass adoption of auto LPG. Remember, there are nearly 300 million vehicles, including two-wheelers plying there on Indian roads. While the current scrappage policy and the Green tax must be appreciated, the government needs to do more and do it quickly. In fact, the frequent occurrence of extreme weather events impacting the country must be treated as a due warning. And so the government right away needs to introduce policy incentives such as reducing GST on conversion kits along with subsidy support which would go a long way in ensuring mass conversion of existing vehicles into those that could be used on cleaner alternative fuels. The resultant reduction in air pollution would definitely help to a great extent in stemming the tide of extreme weather events that we have witnessed in the country and beyond in the recent past,” said Mr. Suyash Gupta, Director General, Indian Auto LPG Coalition.

“A credible report by a London-based international relief and the humanitarian agency has revealed that India suffered the highest loss of lives in a single event globally on account of climate change-driven events last year. This is ominous enough. On an equally grim note, the same report not only described cyclone Amphan to be the costliest cyclone of the year but also triggered the biggest displacement due to an extreme weather event anywhere in the world in 2020. These are dire signs and the authorities must take note of these,” further added Mr. Gupta.

About IAC:

Indian Auto LPG Coalition (IAC) is the nodal body for the promotion of Auto LPG in India. Members of the Coalition include the Oil Sector PSUs, Private Auto LPG marketers, Kit Suppliers, and Equipment Manufacturers. In addition, the Coalition works closely with the World LPG Association and Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers.

IAC is also a member of “Central Motor Vehicle Rules - Technical Standing Committee” (CMVR-TSC) & “Standing Committee on Emission Legislation” (SCOE), TED26 (Bureau of Indian Standards), Government of India.

This Indian-origin Led Startup Plans To Deliver Blazingly Fast Internet 'Wirelessly'

While Facebook, Google, AT&T, and Verizon were still talking about it and putting a plan into action, Starry, a startup led by Indian origin entrepreneur Chaitanya “Chet” Kanojia went ahead and did it. The future of internet access lies in being wireless, and this particular thing is being discussed in the public domain for quite sometime now. But, instead of just doing the talking, Starry decided to jump on the bandwagon and do something concrete.

Starry, a Boston-based internet service provider (ISP) that aims to deliver super-fast internet access wirelessly, has finally launched its first closed beta in the Boston area.

The startup first announced about its Starry Internet service at the starting of this year, along with its Starry Station intelligent router that lets one easily manage their WiFi connections.

The Starry Internet service is capable of providing the user with over 700 Mbps download speeds, which is several times faster than the speeds you can probably get from a cable modem. Yes, it is that fast. Until now, consumers would require a fiber connection to get this kind of speeds.

However, don't get excited so soon. For now, Starry's beta is only catering to a very small number of testers and won't be open as a public beta in whole of Boston until early 2017. Starry has planned not to go beyond the city of Boston till late next year. Also, the startup hasn't yet divulged anything about how much is the service going to actually cost, but they have made the customers quite inquisitive by saying that the price would be much cheaper than what a standard consumer connection costs nowadays. The startup hasn't yet revealed about when the service will exit its beta testing stage and be available to all.

How does Starry work?

In order to make the Starry Internet service function effectively, the startup has planned to install Starry Beams transmitters on the top of buildings in Boston's urban areas. These Beams are then plugged into the fiber internet connections, almost the same way as the wireless carriers transmitters do in order to deliver 4G data to our phones. But, unlike them, Starry Beam makes use of millimeter wave, a different kind of frequency, which is much, much faster than 4G to a receiver in our home.

Those receivers are being called Starry Points, and one can easily install them in their window, almost the same way we install an air conditioner in our home. The Point then ends up connecting to one's WiFi router, and they can easily use this high speed internet normally from there.

Launched in January this year, Starry intends to usher in a new era of broadband connectivity, by developing and deploying the world’s first active phased array technology for consumer internet communications to launch America’s next nationwide fixed wireless broadband provider. With the backing of premier investors including names like FirstMark Capital, Tiger Global, IAC, KKR, HLVP and Quantum Strategic Partners, the startup strongly believes that the future is wireless and is strongly working in that direction.

According to Starry founder and CEO, Chaitanya “Chet” Kanojia, “The future of connectivity is wireless and having simple, affordable access to an internet connection is imperative for every household and business." “But, far too many people don’t have a choice in how they access that connection. We set out to build an innovative alternative to wired broadband using millimeter waves and proprietary technology to deliver ultra high speed broadband to your home, wirelessly. With Starry’s technology, we can deploy and scale faster than traditional wired networks – at a fraction of the cost. This is how the networks of the future will be built around the globe.”

[Top Image- cnet2.cbsistatic.com]