Unit 4 of Law of Insurance (syllabus: Module IV — the idea of social insurance and its statutory expressions: employees’ State insurance, public liability insurance and the Environmental Relief Fund, and the schemes the sources reach — with the heads they do not reach stated as gaps). Below: what the unit covers, the provisions it turns on, and the cases an examiner expects you to name.
What this unit covers
- What is social insurance, and how does it differ from a contract of insurance?
- Why can unemployment and crop failure not be insured on ordinary commercial terms?
- Who is covered by the ESI Act, and what benefits does it give?
- Does statutory relief take away the victim's other remedies, and what happens to contributory negligence?
- What liability does the Public Liability Insurance Act impose, and why must the owner insure?
- How is a claim for relief under the Public Liability Insurance Act made and decided?
- How does the law compel commercial insurers to serve the rural and social sectors?
- What does compulsory insurance mean, and what happens when nobody can be made to pay?
Treat that list as a self-test: recite each topic's rule from memory before you open its cases.
Provisions
- Employees' State Insurance Act 1948, s. ss. 38, 39 and 46
- Insurance Act 1938, s. s. 32C
- Employees' State Insurance Act 1948, s. ss. 1, 46, 55A and 65
- Employees' State Insurance Act 1948; Public Liability Insurance Act 1991, s. ESI ss. 53 and 61; PLI s. 8
- Public Liability Insurance Act 1991, s. ss. 3, 4 and 7A
- Public Liability Insurance Act 1991, s. ss. 5 to 7
- Insurance Act 1938, s. ss. 32B, 32C, 32D and 105B
- Motor Vehicles Act 1988; Public Liability Insurance Act 1991, s. MV ss. 146 and 161; PLI ss. 4 and 7A
Leading cases
- Vikram Greentech (I) Ltd. v. New India Assurance Co.