Insurers can deny claim over hiding drinking habit, says SC

The claims of people who drink alcohol but keep it a secret from their insurance companies could be rejected — even if the death was not directly caused by alcoholism.

- Utkarsh Anand

NEW DELHI:

The Supreme Court has ruled that insurers are within their rights to repudiate claims if policyholders conceal their drinking habit while buying health insurance.

A bench of justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta upheld the Life Insurance Corporation's (LIC) decision to deny a claim under its Jeevan Arogya policy to a man who took the policy in 2013 but failed to disclose that he was a chronic alcoholic. Less than a year later, he was hospitalized in Jhajjar, Haryana, for severe abdominal pain, remained under treatment for nearly a month, and ultimately died of a cardiac arrest.