Page 21 - The Insurance Times July 2025

there has to be some insurance discussion. In other words, that they must show love, affection, concern, and responsi-
insurance is a part of our life. bility towards society. We have invented one of the best
We witness many accidents every day. When I talk about lego-logical ways to go beyond the presently defined bound-
aries of insurer responsibility - i.e. to go beyond claim
accidents here, I mean motor accidents - 2 Wheelers, 4
Wheelers, 6 Wheelers, etc. Whenever we travel from one settlement.
place to another on the national highway, say, from Delhi A vehicle can be considered as total loss if it is inundated. If
to Ambala, we come across beautiful 6-lane highways - these a vehicle is totally inundated, it is a Total Loss. Now look at
roads are in pristine condition, and they are meant to be a the anomaly, the contradiction. The flood recedes; the cars
high-speed driving experience. Along such highways, you also remain - completely soaked, drenched, inundated, and ru-
come across many vehicles lying on the side of the road after ined beyond repair by the floodwaters.
an accident - discarded, unasked, and neglected. I guess, in I must refer to the case of a flood in Chennai few years ago
all probability, the unfortunate vehicle owner, assuming he where the insurer auctioned away all those vehicles. I re-
is alive, must have collected the insurance money from his quest the readers to follow the logic carefully. Salvage deal-
insurer, and the insurer must have taken the salvage. ers purchased the salvage of these vehicles - including

According to Insurance Law, if a vehicle is a Total Loss, the BMWs, Mercedes, Lamborghinis, etc., and simple vehicles
salvage becomes insurer's property once the claim is settled. like Maruti Suzuki 800, Alto etc. The insurers have fulfilled
We have dealt with many cases such as these, hence unlim- their responsibility. They followed the law in letter. They
ited experiences of these accident vehicles. I have witnessed settled the claims, and sold the salvage.
a few such accidents with my own eyes - deaths, blood, crash They followed the law in letter; but violated it in spirit. The
sounds, splintered glass, pitiable cries - unforgettable! salvage dealer then took these vehicles apart, replaced the
The seat covers splashed in red, and the road traffic slows bad parts with good ones from old vehicles, and while the
down for few seconds. The police arrive and clear the ve- body of these vehicles remains the same), the salvage dealer,
hicle from the site. Ambulance takes the deceased/ injured after re-painting these vehicles, sold these cars in the mar-
to the hospital - and the traffic, in a matter of moments, ket as a used car at an attractive price! Any uninformed
moves on as usual. man would be very glad to buy one of these vehicles be-
cause he feels he's getting it cheap. He and his family would
The Motor Vehicles Act says insurance is compulsory. And
by insurance it means it's "third-party insurance" that is love to have a ride in that vehicle.
mandatory. But generally, people insure for Own Damage What the insurer, the salvage dealer, and the new owner
as well as third-party. The debris of the vehicles lying around who acquired the refurbished vehicle do not know is that
the roads - some are collected, taken away, towed away by the vehicle poses a danger to all on the streets. A refur-
agencies associated with the insurance companies, or the bished vehicle - a vehicle that is redone is not safe. It is not
salvage of a particular insurer is purchased by a specific worth being on the road, but it is on the road, and God alone
salvage dealer. Some of the vehicles are not worth towing knows how! It is a potential time bomb and can explode at
away, according to the salvage dealers, because the tow- any time causing irreparable damage to society!
ing cost is more than the cost of the salvage itself! They lie Then when does the responsibility of an insurer end? Being
there forlorn. We behave, each of us, as if nothing has hap- insurance professionals, we appreciate when the claims
pened. Business is as it should be. settlement ratio is 98.9%, but is that all? The money being

Ships sink; we talk of salvage. Airplanes crash; we talk of paid out for these claims does not belong to the insurer.
salvage. Buildings burn: we talk of salvage. Loved ones die, Though insurers are here to earn profits, it must not be
we talk of salvage/ memorial diamonds. Where exactly does forgotten that the money belongs to the policyholders - the
the responsibility of the insurer end in a claim? The moment fortunate many paying for the unfortunate few. People's
the claim is settled, salvage is sold? If this is only the respon- money for people's welfare is especially true in the insur-
sibility of the insurer, then it can be said that insurance com- ance sector. How is this Guardian Knot to be unknotted? How
panies are more interested they can be reproached in mak- is this apparent financio-moral dilemma be answered?
ing money, not in public safety. This was the first step we took towards the patent. The fi-
During those long, endless mornings, our discussions nal objective of our six-year thought process which resulted
revolved around: when does the responsibility of an insurer in an invention and a patent is about how to make insurers
end? This is not a moral question, but a pragmatic humane. After having taken this first step, we intuitively
one. Insurance companies must be humanistic in the sense knew, what the last step has to be.

The Insurance Times July 2025 19