Protecting Your Home

A short circuit caused a fire in the house of Shirish Patel (name changed) at Borivali in Mumbai, and damaged his wall unit, television set and few other valuable items. Fortunately, the Patel family was at home and the family members were able to put out the fire before it could do any further damage. Apart from damaging the wall unit and other electronic items, the flames partially burnt the false ceiling and blackened the wall behind the wall unit as well as the adjoining wall. The total loss, including the cost of repainting the living room and repairing the false ceiling, was estimated at Rs 55,000. Fortunately, Patel had taken a householder’s comprehensive insurance policy and received about Rs 40,000 from the insurance company.

This is just one instance of how our homes are vulnerable to damage due to various reasons. Imagine how much risk our homes are exposed to due to natural calamities such as earthquake, typhoon, flooding, lightening, among others, as well as man-made events such as rioting, terrorist attack, accidental fire, explosion, etc. It is imperative, therefore, that every homeowner should insure his home and hearth against such natural and man-made calamities by taking a householder’s insurance policy.

The natural disasters such as earthquake, typhoon, tsunami, lightening strike, fire, landslides or monsoon deluge (a la Mumbai’s 26/7 in 2005) can strike any moment and leave a trail of death, destruction and devastation behind. Also, terrorist attacks by anti-nationals and foreign mercenaries are becoming frequent in metro cities and escalating social and communal tensions can trigger riots, endangering lives and properties of citizens. Then again, one cannot rule out the possibility of burglary and theft in the house by hardened criminals. If the survivors of these natural calamities and man-made disasters have insured their homes and belongings, they would be able to rebuild their lives in double-quick time and move on.

The Policy
The householder’s insurance policy is specifically aimed at compensating losses suffered by homeowners due to damage to their houses and valuable belongings therein due to specified natural and unnatural causes.