Kolkata: Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday said that she has decided to pull out the state from the central government’s Ayushman Bharat scheme.
She has also asked the Centre to pay the complete amount if it wants to run the scheme.
Bengal will not contribute 40% of the funds for Ayushman Bharat, the chief minister said. This move by Banerjee shows that she is putting politics over healthcare that would ultimately benefit the people of her state.
The Ayushman Bharat scheme in Bengal was merged with Banerjee’s Swasthya Sathi health scheme.
Banerjee has alleged that there is a lack of transparency in the government’s projection of the scheme.
Modicare or Ayushman Bharat, a pet project of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, was launched in September 2018.
However, five states had chosen to opt out of it, claiming that they had better healthcare schemes. They were Telangana, Odisha, Delhi, Kerala and Punjab. Now Bengal joins the list.