Adhyatma: A Journal of Management, Spirituality, and Human Values, July-December - 2018 21 © Eureka Journals 2018. All Rights Reserved. ISSN: 2581-7809 Ethical Sales Behaviour in Insurance Business- A Study in Indian Context Abhijit Chakraborty Research Scholar, Department of Management Studies, NIT Silchar, Assam, India Dr. Ashim Kumar Das Assistant Professor, Department of Management Studies, NIT Silchar, Assam, India The Business of Business is Business. This famous quote gives rise to a long debated controversy on the responsibilities of Business towards the eco-system in which it exists. One of the many responsibilities that is expected from a Business includes the most important one- ‘Ethics’. The importance of Ethics in a Business can never be exaggerated as it works as lubricant in the organisational machinery ensuring smooth and long uninterrupted running. This become all the more applicable in case of Financial Industry, including Insurance. The importance of Ethics escalates in Financial Industry due to its very nature of business, featured with products having complexity, intangibility, deferred maturity and information asymmetry. The Insurance Business is mostly carried out by field level salesman known as Insurance Advisors who are duly authorised by the Insurer and IRDA to represent and conduct the sale. And hence the Insurance Agents shoulder on the responsibility to carry out activities in a manner so as to have a positive impression on the Customer community not only about himself but of the Insurer as well. Introduction Ethical Sales Behaviour is mostly a situation specific concept and it is hard to define in an exact manner (Lagace, R.R. et al., 1991). The definition of ethics is not an universally accepted one, neither there exists a clear cut demarcation line between ethical and unethical actions (Turnipseed, D.L. 2002). The widely accepted basis of distinguishing ethical and unethical behaviour is the degree to which that particular behaviour is perceived as good or bad, fair or unfair, beneficial or harming, right or wrong etc. (Hunt, S.D. &Vitell, S.J. 1986). The Oxford Learners Dictionary defines Ethics as a “system of moral priniciples, rules and conduct.” Ethics is a general term that finds its presence in every human behaviour, activity, efforts including Business. The importance of Ethics in business is all the more in the sense that business activities involves lot of persons in the form of employees, customers, suppliers, competitors, shareholders etc. and the entire society at large. Beside these set of external elements being affected by the existence of ethics in business, the business itself requires to adhere to ethical practices for the sake of its own survival in the long run. It has a become a mandatory practice on the part of the business units to adhere to a preset framework of Code of Ethics designed by the experts in the organisation itself which works as a self regulatory mechanism. The significance of Ethics in relation to Insurance is of a very high degree especially because of the inherent unique features of insurance product which includes intangibility, complexity, future benefit, personal selling, after sales servicing, deferment of current consumption etc. Since majority of the insurance selling is undertaken by the Insurance Advisors, we will keep out study confined with the Sales Behaviour of Insurance Advisors only. Literature Survey Insurance agents are the most widely accepted medium of dealing in insurance for both the suppliers as well as the clients. The suppliers, Insurers prefer selling through Insurance Agents because of many reasons including requirement of personal selling, assurance of post sale service, better reach, personalised presentation of the product, maintenance of standard norms in selling process etc, whereas the clients feel like to buy through Insurance Agents mainly because of their dependability, trust factor, associated services, Abstract