ANOTHER JUDGE REFUSES TO HEAR PF SCAM CASE

New Delhi: The Supreme Court, hearing a petition against sitting and retired High Court and District Judges, said to be involved in a Rs 26 crore provident fund scam in Ghaziabad, witnessed an unruly scene on Thursday with Justice BN Agrawal being the second judge in a span of ten days who refused to hear the case being upset over comments by senior advocate Shanti Bhushan.

On July 30, Chief Justice KG Balakrishnan had refused to hear the case any further after Bhushan challenged an administrative order given by the Chief Justice instructing the SSP of Uttar Pradesh police to send its queries of what was sought to be asked from the judges. Bhushan, who argued on behalf of NGO Transparency International criticised that such a practice was 'unheard of' and sought to challenge its correctness, forcing the Chief Justice to constitute another bench headed by Justice BN Agrawal, the second senior-most judge.

The argument commenced on August 1 before a three-judge bench headed by Justice Agrawal and proceeded for two and a half days. On Thursday, Bhushan commenced arguments by stating that the orders passed by the court give an impression that 'this court is giving protection to corrupt judicial officers.' The Bench warned him to refrain from making such 'contemptuous' remarks. Bhushan, however, refused to apologise stating he accepted to be hauled for contempt instead.

The matter then proceeded when he decided to withdraw his comment and proceeded with the arguments in the case. The hearing was marred by intermittent stops caused by disagreement on the arguments made from the Bench. At one point, when Bhushan sought to explain the power of the police to arrest being restricted, Justice Agrawal took umbrage and said, "We don't know how you being an eminent lawyer of this country is arguing in this manner" and later compared his arguments to that of a 'street urchin'.

The argument before the court was on the crucial aspect of which investigating agency, whether the CBI or the state police are well-equipped to handle a scandal of this huge dimension involving judges. But the argument went on a different tangent, as the nitty-gritty of criminal investigation became the subject of debate.

Things were under control till Prashant Bhushan got up and charged the Bench of pushing his father against the wall. Enraged by the Court's quizzing his father, Prashant said, "You are again and again putting words in the mouth of the senior counsel."

This added the necessary spark with both the judge and the lawyer crossing swords. Alarmed by the backlash, the Bench remarked, "What business has Shanti Bhushan to shout at judges. He has conducted professional misconduct. We would have initiated contempt proceedings, but we wont do it out of respect for the senior counsel." Ruing the precedent set by him, the judge said, "The way in which Bar is behaving we are sorry. You are only here to abuse the judiciary. If this is the state of affairs, we cannot hear the case."

Source: The Pioneer

BHARTI AXA GENERAL PLANS CAPITAL INFUSION OF RS 645 CRORE

Mumbai: Bharti AXA General Insurance, the latest entrant in the general insurance business in the country, is planning capital infusion of Rs 645 crore over the next five years. Announcing the commencement of its operations here today, Milind Chalisgaonkar, chief executive officer said the general insurance market in India has strong growth potential. He said the two joint venture partners, namely, Bharti Enterprises which has 74 per cent stake in the company and AXA, a major insurance player internationally holding 26 per cent stake have already invested Rs 130 crore in the venture. The insurance regulations require minimum capital of only Rs 100 crore. Responding to queries on the quantum of business the company is targetting, he said he would not like to make forward looking statement. He also pointed out there is no formula that a company could generate a certain level of business based on the capital invested. He, however, indicated a company could possibly generate business which is four to five times the capital. There are 25 crore middle class people. The parent company Bharti has 72 million consumers and Bharti group's reach would be leveraged to grow business, he said. He said the company will offer products to cover property, motor, health, personal accident across rural, urban and commercial segments. It is the third JV Bharti has entered into with AXA. Earlier, the company had entered into JV with AXA for life insurance and for an asset management company.

Source: PTI, The Economic Times, Asian Age, The Hindu Business Line, The Hindu, The Telegraph, The Statesman, Business Standard, Deccan Chronicle, Daily News & Analysis

ORIENTAL INSURANCE EYES 10% GROWTH IN PREMIUM

Bangalore: Oriental Insurance Company, a state-owned general insurance firm, has stated that it plans to grow its premium collections by 10 per cent during the current financial year as against the nominal growth recorded in the last fiscal, which reported a collection of Rs 3,900 crore.

The company is actively implementing comprehensive proposals on business process re-engineering advised by the Boston Consulting Group in an effort to stave of increased competition from private players. During the first quarter of the current financial year, the company has reported collections of Rs 1,100 crore.

“We are cautious. The premium rates are falling and there is a maddening rush to maintain the top line growth. Last year, there was hardly any growth and we intend to improve our performance during the year,” Chairman and Managing Director M Ramadoss said.

Ramadoss was in Bangalore to launch a series of initiatives aimed at retaining its customers. The company launched a service through which a car-owner, insured by Oriental, if stranded with a break-down on a highway, can access various TVS Group’s authorised garages to have the vehicle repaired, at no cost to the customer.

“This is one of the steps we are taking to face competition. During the last quarter, our average settlement claim in certain markets was brought down to 15 days from the earlier 78 days. This exercise will be expanded across India, through which we anticipate that the renewals will be higher,” Ramadoss said.

These initiatives are much needed for this general insurer as during the first quarter of the current fiscal, it was displaced from its fourth position by ICICI Lombard, a private insurer. On an average, Oriental writes in close to a crore policies.

Oriental Insurance, which currently has a Rs 8,000-crore investment portfolio, invests 55 per cent of the portfolio in unregulated investments such as equities (18 per cent) and mutual funds. Explaining his company’s investment outlook for the bearish market, Ramadoss said, “Given the current (state of the) equities market, we are now focusing on investing in bonds.”

Ramadoss once again reiterated his stand that the central government should allow state-owned general insurers to go public.

Source: Business Standard, Deccan Chronicle

MNYL TO GET RS 3,600 CR INFUSION

Mumbai: Max New York Life Insurance (MNYL) has clocked a first year premium of Rs 1195 crore. The assets under management (AUM) have increased to over Rs 4138 crore on July 31, 2008, compared with Rs 2271 crore in the year-ago period.

The insurer plans to significantly expand its distribution footprint by opening more than 250 new offices every year for the next three to four years. During the period, the number of agent advisors is expected to touch 3,00,000 from current 46,800, while the company’s capital base will increase to Rs 3,600 crore from current equity base of Rs 1,232 crore.

This year alone, MNYL has launched more than 100 new offices. It has a presence in 212 cities through 311 offices. The rural business of MNYL started its hub-and-spoke operations in Haryana and Punjab.

The company has entered into a distribution tie-up with four corporate agents, five broking houses and bancassurance through eight referral tie-ups with banks.
During January-July 2008, MNYL has added more than 5,000 employees and now has over 11,000 employees.

“We have acquired around 27 lakh policies since inception and have moved to number three position among private life insurers in terms of number of policies sold (YTD June),” said Rajesh Sud, deputy managing director, MNYL.

Source: Business Standard

APONLINE TO MARKET LIC PRODUCTS

APOnline, the digital portal for citizens of AP, has become a Corporate Agency of LIC India to market its insurance products in the state of Andhra Pradesh. APOnline has been selected because of its wide and well established network of franchisees across AP.

It has been successfully providing insurance premium collection services to LIC for the last 8 months in the state of Andhra Pradesh. This new service will add greater value to the citizens as insurance policies will now be available across all APOnline kiosks in every locality.

APOnline has over 1100 Franchisees spread over 21 Districts and these franchisees have a customer base of around 10 lakhs. Leveraging the network of APOnline, LIC of India will be able to reach its products and services to the rural population in Andhra Pradesh.
Apart from enabling better governance, APOnline has also provided franchisees with another means of livelihood and has become a big success in rural areas.

Source: The Hindu Business Line