DISHA INVESTMENTS

Life insurance (or life assurance, especially in the Commonwealth), is a contract between an insurance policy holder and an insurer or assurer, where the insurer promises to pay a designated beneficiary a sum of money (the benefit) in exchange for a premium, upon the death of an insured person (often the policy holder). Depending on the contract, other events such as terminal illness or critical illness can also trigger payment. The policy holder typically pays a premium, either regularly or as one lump sum. Other expenses (such as funeral expenses) can also be included in the benefits.

Life policies are legal contracts and the terms of the contract describe the limitations of the insured events. Specific exclusions are often written into the contract to limit the liability of the insurer; common examples are claims relating to suicide, fraud, war, riot, and civil commotion.

Life-based contracts tend to fall into two major categories:

• Protection policies – designed to provide a benefit, typically a lump sum payment, in the event of specified event. A common form of a protection policy design is term insurance.
• Investment policies – where the main objective is to facilitate the growth of capital by regular or single premiums. Common forms (in the U.S.) are whole life, universal life, and variable life policies.

Key Benefits of Life Insurance

Life insurance, especially tailored to meet your financial needs
Need for Life Insurance
Today, there is no shortage of investment options for a person to choose from. Modern day investments include gold, property, fixed income instruments, mutual funds and of course, life insurance. Given the plethora of choices, it becomes imperative to make the right choice when investing your hard-earned money. Life insurance is a unique investment that helps you to meet your dual needs - saving for life's important goals, and protecting your assets.

Let us look at these unique benefits of life insurance in detail.
Asset Protection
From an investor's point of view, an investment can play two roles - asset appreciation or asset protection. While most financial instruments have the underlying benefit of asset appreciation, life insurance is unique in that it gives the customer the reassurance of asset protection, along with a strong element of asset appreciation.

The core benefit of life insurance is that the financial interests of one’s family remain protected from circumstances such as loss of income due to critical illness or death of the policyholder. Simultaneously, insurance products also have a strong inbuilt wealth creation proposition. The customer therefore benefits on two counts and life insurance occupies a unique space in the landscape of investment options available to a customer.
Goal based savings
Each of us has some goals in life for which we need to save. For a young, newly married couple, it could be buying a house. Once, they decide to start a family, the goal changes to planning for the education or marriage of their children. As one grows older, planning for one's retirement will begin to take precedence.

Clearly, as your life stage and therefore your financial goals change, the instrument in which you invest should offer corresponding benefits pertinent to the new life stage.

Life insurance is the only investment option that offers specific products tailormade for different life stages. It thus ensures that the benefits offered to the customer reflect the needs of the customer at that particular life stage, and hence ensures that the financial goals of that life stage are met.

The table below gives a general guide to the plans that are appropriate for different life stages.