The life Insurance Corporation of India or LIC has shown the way forward for other institutions to follow suit by declaring that same-sex partners can nominate each other for insurance.
LIC recently replied to an RTI affidavit filed by a same-sex couple in Kolkata that questioned if there was a legal bar on the same-sex partner being a nominee in the insurance policies availed. LIC replied that gender would not be a barrier, according to news reports.
Suchandra Das, one of the partners and RTI applicant, told news sources, about the response, “In effect, this means that there is no bar for a policyholder from making a person not related to him or her by birth, consanguinity, marriage, or adoption as his or her nominee.”
News reports also claimed that in recent times, private and public insurance companies had rejected such claims.
However, the reports also quoted the legal side saying this essentially didn’t mean they were the successor of the proceeds but only a valid agent of the policyholder.
LIC’s clear stand on the issue has turned the spotlight on the rest of the institutions to come forward to present their case.
