17-year-old Ahmedabad Girl Meha Parekh is Helping Women Get Insured

Life insurance is important for financial security, however in India the country remains very low at just over 3 percent. Meha Parekh, a high school student from Ahmedabad, has set up a startup that focuses on making insurance accessible to women. Meha’s startup InSurvive is a social venture that is helping insure the lives of women from underprivileged backgrounds and making them self-reliant.

Meha states that, “While working on a school project, I learnt that a lot of women had bank accounts, but only a small minority had life insurance. Women are the main beneficiaries of life insurance but are reluctant to avail of insurance even though cases of families facing financial struggles due to the breadwinner’s death are quite common. The objective of establishing InSurvive was to make women aware of the importance of insurance and to make it easy for them to purchase insurance.”

InSurvive has also collaborated with NGOs such as Karma Foundation, Yoganjali Kelvani Mandal, and Akhand Jyot in addition to some corporate houses to hold insurance camps. The startup also assists women that don’t have bank accounts with opening one. Mehad added, “Hundreds of women have been able to avail of life insurance policies easily at these camps, and we are happy to have been able to help secure their future.”

InSurvive is also aiming to empower women to become self-reliant and is organizing empowerment sessions. Meha states, “We want to help women find financial stability, independence, and dignity. We want to equip women with knowledge of insurance and prepare them to resolve any financial predicaments they may encounter. We are in talks with several NGOs to hold insurance camps and hope to reach the maximum number of women.”

Chiranjiv Patel, entrepreneur and founder of Karma Foundation stated, “We were highly impressed when we first came across this startup. It has a unique idea and has the potential to have a profound impact on the lives of beneficiary women. We have already held an insurance camp along with InSurvive and look forward to working closely with it in the future.”

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