India First Maha Jeevan Plan is an endowment scheme that allows the policyholder to choose a policy term anywhere between 10 and 25 years. A distinguishing factor of this scheme is that it offers three lifecover options to the policyholder — Classic: here the life cover is equal to the amount of sum assured; Silver: life cover is twice the amount of sum assured and Gold: life cover is thrice the amount of sum assured.

The premium payable is thus determined by the policy term and the life cover option chosen by the policyholder.

India First Maha Jeevan Plan's unique selling point (USP) lies in the three life cover options that the scheme provides. The scheme can thus be said to be portraying more of the insurance option than the investment side. This is also evident from the kind of premiums that the scheme charges, especially for the higher life covers, where the premium payable exceeds the survival benefit.

Thus, if insurance is the purpose to buy Maha Jeevan, investors would rather do well to opt for India First Life Plan instead — a pure term plan with relativelylow premium charges, as illustrated…

While one can always argue that a pure term plan will not return any benefit on maturity, the fact remains that the premiums payable here are extremely low, giving investors an option to invest the surplus saved (which would have otherwise been used to pay premium for Maha Jeevan) optimally to generate higher returns.