Abstract

Jawaharlal H. Tagore

It is a known fact that there are three agents of underdevelopment, that is, poverty, disease and ignorance in the world. Micromedi claim in India presently is too small to create a great impact in poverty alleviation, but if provided with new technologies for skills and opportunities for the development of the poor, it holds to change the socio-economic face of the India's poor. The self-help group (SHG) model with micromedi claim through SHG group leading to groups without collateral has become an established part of rural development with financial inclusion. SHG-based micromediclaim which is run and supported by NGOs, have become a significant alternative to traditional medical insurance in terms of reaching the poor without increase in operating and monitoring costs. The government and financial institution have accepted this and have highlighted the SHG model and taken initiatives to work along with NGOs. Millions of SHGs have been linked to banks over the years, but still most of the states are not doing well to establish the development, link up the social responsible process of the poor and nurture the various schemes of the government. This paper also discusses why rural poor easily get the mediclaim from ‘regional rural bank’ by using this Micromediclaim-SHG-bank linkage model.