Key Points
SBI Life Insurance was ordered by the National Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (NCDRC) to pay a deceased customer's husband the full amount of insurance claim to settle the remaining amount of home loan taken from State Bank of India (SBI)..
SBI Life Insurance rejected the insurance claim because the insurance policy had been obtained by suppressing material evidence pertaining to pre-existing illnesses of the policyholder who was then deceased..
After the rejection of the insurance claim from the insurance company, the husband of the deceased policyholder filed a case in the District Consumer Forum...
The District Consumer Forum in their order dated October 15, 2015, said, "We find that the insurance death claim has been repudiated for the other prime reason that the deceased policyholder suppressed the fact of her continuing ailments (as alleged) in her 'proposal form' pertaining to the policy in question..
However, it needs to be examined against the backdrop that the policyholder never herself opted for the insurance policy out of her free will (since it was never routine/standard life/health policy etc.,) and she had to compulsorily go in for its purchase at the instance/ compelling persuasion of the bank from who she had availed 'housing loan' and thus being in a subservient position she had to join the bank's group insurance as member and to purchase the said policy that indemnified the housing loan outstanding but only in the remotest event of the sad demise of the borrowing policyholder."..
