Delhi will not implement Ayushman Bharat, says Health Minister Satyendra Jain

Delhi Health Minister Satyendra Jain said on Tuesday that the Delhi government would not implement the Centre’s Ayushman Bharat Yojana in the national capital, criticising the scheme and the BJP’s handling of it.

Jain’s objections

Jain questioned why, if the scheme had been put in place in Uttar Pradesh and Haryana, patients from those states were still being sent to Delhi for treatment. He said Delhi has a population of 2 crore, of whom only 10 lakh would benefit from Ayushman Bharat, and so the city would not adopt it.

The Delhi government, he said, would provide health care to 100 percent of its population without choosing between rich and poor, since government hospitals and medical facilities are meant for everyone. He claimed about 70 percent of patients in Delhi come from Uttar Pradesh, and said the Centre should first deliver the scheme’s benefits there and in Haryana. Such policies, he alleged, existed only on paper; had it worked, people from Uttar Pradesh would be treated in their own state.

The Centre’s push

Union Minister Harsh Vardhan, who took charge of the Health Ministry on Monday, had said he would write to chief ministers of five states that had not yet rolled out the AB-PMJAY scheme: Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Odisha and Delhi. The scheme gives each vulnerable family medical cover of Rs 5 lakh a year.

Background

Delhi’s Aam Aadmi Party government went on to face the 2020 Assembly election, in which AAP won 62 seats and the BJP 8, and Arvind Kejriwal was Chief Minister after the election.

See also: Aam Aadmi Party and BJP.

Originally published on 4 June 2019. Rewritten on 9 October 2026.

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