India’s missing insurance regulator

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Editor's note: On 6 May 2021, the day India clocked its highest number of COVID-19 cases, Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India chairman Subhash C. Khuntia vacated his office in Hyderabad. His tenure had ended. On that day, India recorded 414,000 new cases and 3,923 deaths. With fresh cases at 8,439 and deaths below 200 on Wednesday, the pandemic has eased comparatively but it shows no sign of going away. Rather, there are now concerns over a new wave of infections, with the World Health Organization categorizing the Omicron strain as a variant of concern. Seven months on, IRDAI remains headless. That’s not all. Back in March, the tenure of the insurance regulator’s seniormost whole-time board member Pravin Kutumbe ended. Besides, two of the four government-appointed board seats also fell vacant around the same time.  It is now December; none of these vacancies has been filled. Khuntia’s three-year tenure ended at a particularly tricky juncture for the insurance industry. It has been ravaged by the pandemic. On top of the logistical and solvency challenges faced by the 55 active health and …