Summary (English)

At present, it is considered that more than 90 per cent of the Indian population still does not benefit from any kind of social protection. Being not protected against the various risks they face on a daily basis, broad segments of the population remain caught in a continuing cycle of vulnerability and poverty. However, a growing perception of the necessity to extend social protection to all excluded groups has recently been observed in India, together with a wider commitment to actively contribute to this extension through various strategies, including the promotion on new micro insurance schemes. As a direct result, numerous actors of the civil society (community based organisations, women's groups, informal economy trade unions, NGOs, micro finance institutions, etc.) have already designed and set up in-house tailor-made micro insurance schemes, to answer the priority needs and contributory capacity of their target groups. Also, recent regulations issued by the Central Government, allowed for both public and private insurance companies to intervene in this new sub-sector and to tie up with various development and grassroots organizations for the provision of new insurance products to the disadvantaged groups. The present inventory identifies 60 micro insurance schemes in India, from which 51 are currently operating.