G Virat Singh/ENS

Bangalore, Mar 17: The Karnataka Government's 'Yashaswini' health insurance scheme, which was hitherto covering farmers and weavers, will hereafter cover members of all the cooperative societies in rural areas too.

The norms for the selection of beneficiaries to be covered under the liberalised scheme include the head of the Hindu Undivided Family (HUF) who is a member of a cooperative society for at least six months.

According to a notification issued in this regard by the State Cooperation Department, which is in charge of the scheme implementation, the liberalised scheme allows all members of such an HUF to avail themselves of the benefit.

As per the new norms, all members of such an HUF, including married children, daughter-in-law and grandchildren, are eligible for benefits. If five or more members were enrolled in the scheme from one family, a 15 per cent discount in the premium is allowed. A uniform premium of Rs. 120 will be collected, irrespective of whether the beneficiary is an adult or a child.

Adults were to pay Rs.120 as annual premium and minors Rs.60 till last year. It has been decided to collect Rs.10 extra from beneficiaries covered under the scheme to take care of the office expenditure in maintaining records and payment of incentives to the staff involved in the registration of beneficiaries.

Officer on special duty (Yashaswini scheme) Huchachari told this website's newspaper that the cooperation department itself was overseeing the scheme implementation without having any tie-up with any general insurance companies and he maintained that over 1.1 lakh insured people have undergone various types of surgical operations ever since the scheme became operational in 2003-2004.

The department is also working out a scheme to end the dependence on the government for financial support and make the scheme self-sufficient.

There are about 96 lakh cooperative society members but only 23 lakh are covered under the scheme.

The Government has fixed a target of covering at least 50 lakh members under the scheme this year. The members of the scheme are eligible to get free medical treatment in select hospitals in the country.

They are eligible for a maximum health insurance benefit of up to Rs 1.2 lakh in case of surgery and other serious ailments.

The decision of the government to liberalise the scheme is aimed at extending the benefit to a larger section of society which is denied of health insurance facility, sources maintained.