Is PUC certificate mandatory for vehicle insurance claims?

You can get the PUC certificate from any authorized emission testing center. A PUC certificate confirms that the amount of carbon monoxide emitted by the vehicle is within a legally acceptable limit. This certificate is one of the primary documents required for driving in the country.

Supreme Court verdict: “The Government of India has made PUC certificate mandatory for all vehicles under the Central Motor Vehicles Rules of 1989,” said Nitin Dev, Chief Technical Officer, Edelweiss General Insurance. Hence, the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDA) has asked the insurance companies not to insure the vehicle without a valid PUC certificate.

As per the IRDA notification, vehicle owners have to submit a valid PUC certificate while renewing their insurance. By law, no vehicle can be operated without third party insurance, a rule that is often broken due to lax enforcement. Irdai’s decision is based on a Supreme Court judgment which held that insurers cannot insure a car unless it has an effective PUC certificate on the date of policy renewal,” said Bajaj Capital Ltd., joint chairman and MD Sanjeev Bajaj said. However, this does not mean that your insurance claim will be rejected if you do not have a valid PUC certificate.

New KYC norms: In November, the newly introduced KYC norms have nothing to do with PUC certificates to ease the insurance claim settlement process.

“There is no such update yet. IRDA issued a circular on 26 August 2020 when they observed that some media reports misrepresented the earlier circular issued by the regulator. Thus, in August 2020, IRDA clarified that if you do not have a valid PUC certificate, it does not mean that it is a valid reason for denial of claim under a motor insurance policy,” said Dev.

Animesh Das, Senior Director, Motor Mindwriting, ACKO, said, “The insurance claim is not dependent on the status of the PUC. There is some misleading information in the market claiming that PUC is mandatory for claims, but this is false.”

For example, suppose your PUC certificate has expired and your car soon gets into an accident, the insurer is legally bound to settle your claim.

Validity: When you buy a new car, the PUC certificate is valid for the first year. After that, you will have to do a PUC check every three or six months, be it a petrol or diesel car. Therefore, it is imperative to get your vehicle’s pollution emission levels tested regularly in order to renew the PUC certificate.

electric vehicles: You do not need a PUC certificate for Electric Vehicles (EVs). “EVs are environment-friendly and hence there is no such provision,” Das said.