GIC taking stakeholders' views on creating Nuclear Insurance Pool

With India's nuclear liability issue holding up deals with various countries, state-run General Insurance Corp (GIC) has conducted an international workshop of stake-holders here recently on creation of a nuclear insurance pool, parliament was told on Thursday.

"The General Insurance Corporation have conducted an international workshop in New Delhi on March 20, 2015 to take inputs from various stake-holders as well as clarify their doubts in the context of development of an appropriate insurance product to cover the liability under Civil Liability for Nuclear Damages (CLND) Act," Minister of State in the Prime Minister's Office Jitendra Singh told the Rajya Sabha in a written reply.

An official source told IANS that GIC had informed that of the Rs.1,500 crore of insurance cover required for the proposed Nuclear Insurance Pool, they would be in a position to provide only Rs.750 crore equivalent of insurance.

The company had requested a government guarantee for the remaining amount of Rs.750 crore to operationalise the nuclear insurance pool, the source said.

Under the CLND Act, besides the operator - Nuclear Power Corp, equipment and material suppliers are also liable to pay damages if an accident occurs. Compensation of up to $244 million will have to be paid in case of an accident at any of the nuclear plant covered by the law.

Currently, nuclear plants in India only have insurance cover for zones that are outside the area of radiation and reactors. The new pool will provide insurance cover for both hot zones -- radiation and nuclear reactors -- and cold zones -- outside the reactor areas.

At present, India has 20 nuclear power plants.