Report by Michael Rodrigues
Team Mangalorean Udupi

Udupi: Members of LIC Agents' Organization of India (LICAOI), City division, staged a protest pressing for various demands at the LIC divisional office on Wednesday August 8.

Addressing the protesters Ramesh Kumar ,Secretary of state LIC Agents organisaiton said that, service tax on LIC policies was introduced in 2008. We had represented at that time itself that LIC policies are a safety measure to cover the risk of citizens and should not be treated as an investment so as to attract service tax. Our request was not favorably considered till now.  Now the service tax has been increased from 1.5 to 3% he said.

Further he said that this is an unbearable burden on LIC and ultimately this may get transferred on to the policy holder. The very survival is going to be threatened for LIC. If LIC’s business falls down, the direct looser is government itself, he said. He urged the union government to exempt LIC from paying service tax. He also demanded to introduce pension scheme for agents with contribution from LIC, government and agents. He demanded withdrawal of amendments to the Agents' Regulations Act 1972 on direct selling of polices. He urged to start welfare fund and mediclaim with ID Card for all agents.

Organization president Rajan M D'Costa, General Secretary Lazarus D’Costa, Treasurer Suman Rao, Gurudath, Derick Rebello were present on the occasion.'