There are talks about expanding the network to other cities as well and making MAN an all-India facility. When that happens, someone with a policy from, say, Delhi, will be able to pay his premium anywhere outside Delhi as well. But no definite plans have emerged yet on this front, says Pawan Kumar Verma, senior divisional manager, Life Insurance Corporation of India. Verma adds that there's no immediacy to make it an all-India network because LIC premia are a fixed day payment. Meaning there's hardly ever any need of sudden and unplanned payment in the case of an LIC premium.

Nevertheless, policy holders are happy about thenovelty being offered by LIC. Says S N Prasad, a resident of Vasant Kunj, Delhi: ``I got my policy from the Daryaganj branch, also in Delhi, seven years ago. The first few years, my agent deposited the premium, so I wasn't bothered. Then the agent disappeared and it was a pain for me to go all the way to Daryaganj to pay my premium.'' Prasad is overjoyed with the MAN concept. He says: ``Now I can just go to any branch in the city and deposit the premium. No queue, no sweat.''

Similar sentiments are echoed by Meenakshi Rana of Mayur Vihar. Rana, an executive with a private sector bank, shifted residence two years ago. Says she: ``It's such a big relief that I can just pay my premium at an LIC branch convenient to me. It's like going to an ATM of a bank.''

Sanjay Sharma of R K Puram agrees. He says: ``Now I can get this job done on my way to office. Not like the earlier days when I had to chase the agent for weeks to get the premium deposited by the due date.'' Since Sharma has to travel frequently out ofDelhi, he wishes ``LIC would make it a countrywide service so that I can deposit my premium anywhere''.

Rohit Srivastava, another policy holder, is also of the opinion that one should be able to deposit an LIC premium anywhere in the country. Says Srivastava: ``In the age of globalisation that we are living in, that's the least we can expect.'' He asks: ``Why limit the facility to just this much and not any more?''

But LIC is moving step by step, keeping the competition in mind. And whether it's for convenience like MAN, or better schemes being introduced, LIC's popularity has gone up over the years, says Verma of LIC. Take, for example, the Bima Nivesh scheme, says Verma. According to him, 33 per cent of the business is coming from that single product alone. The assured returns, liquidity after one year and tax-free proceeds are some of the features that the customers have fallen for.

Verma says that Bima Nivesh is so popular with the elite that LIC is receiving calls to the effect that the upper limitof Rs 5 lakh is just not enough. There are people wanting to invest up to Rs 1 crore in the scheme.But with so many investment schemes coming into the market these days, how's LIC coping? Easy, beams Verma, apart from Bima Nivesh, LIC is not in the investment business at all: ``We're in the savings and risk-cover business.''