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Maharashtra government announces free insurance scheme for legislators and their families
Mumbai city news: The government will have to set aside Rs9.96 crore a year to pay the insurance premiums of 335 sitting legislators and 837 former legislators — 1,172 in all.
The Maharashtra government has decided to give free medical insurance cover of up to Rs10 lakh to all sitting and former legislators and their families. The government will have to set aside Rs9.96 crore a year to pay the insurance premiums of 335 sitting legislators and 837 former legislators — 1,172 in all. Each premium works out to Rs85,000.
Legislators were earlier covered by the government’s medical reimbursement scheme. A committee headed by top medical officials would examine and approve medical bills submitted by legislators. The annual expenditure on such reimbursements was about Rs9crore to Rs10 crore.
Under the new scheme, six of a family, regardless of their age and medical condition, are collectively entitled to an insurance cover of up to Rs10 lakh.
If the cover is exhausted, the policy has a contingency provision of Rs10 crore for all legislators.
Family members of legislators won’t have to undergo any medical tests, said an official. Chief minster Devendra Fadnavis took the decision three weeks ago, said the official.
Earlier, the government had proposed an annual insurance cover of Rs15 lakh for each legislator. This would have increased the state’s financial burden by Rs4 crore.
With the insurance scheme, the government expects to curb the use of fake bills for reimbursements. “In many cases, we found that legislators had submitted fake and duplicate bills to claim medical reimbursement,” said an official from the finance department.
Officials who clear medical bills said the insurance scheme would be better than the existing one.
“We have a network of 4,700 hospitals across the country under the insurance scheme. It will be a cashless facility and the insured members will not have to pay from their pockets. The reimbursement scheme covered only five critical and 27 serious diseases,” he added.
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