Free treatment under Vay Vandana scheme for senior citizens aged 70 and above still elusive in Karnataka
Responding to the State's letter seeking adequate support to implement the Vay Vandana scheme, which is an extended part of the Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY), the Centre has requested Karnataka to start providing the services and that the payment modalities for additional cost will be worked out soon.
Sharing ratio
Expressing the State's inability to start the Vay Vandana scheme without any clarity on the fund release, Karnataka's Principal Secretary (Health) Harsh Gupta had written to the Union Health Secretary pointing out that the State is entitled to get ₹36.58 crore from the Centre for the scheme as per the 60:40 sharing ratio of Ayushman Bharat Arogya Karnataka (AB-ArK) scheme.
'Although the sharing ratio for the health scheme between the Centre and State should be 60:40, it is actually 25:75 as the State bears expenditure for around 1.12 crore families while the Centre is only funding the expenses of 69 lakh families as listed under the Socio Economic and Caste Census (SECC) 2011 data,' he said in the letter.
Of the total AB-ArK beneficiaries, the State has around 15.12 lakh families with senior citizens as members. Of these, 9.22 lakh are SECC-identified families (tagged families), and the remaining are over and above the SECC-identified families (untagged families). 'The Centre will provide the State with additional support at the rate of a mere ₹75.7 per family per annum for tagged families and ₹1,052 per family per annum for the untagged families. However, additional support to the untagged families will be provided only after the 69 lakh families out of 1.12 crore total families are tagged,' the letter stated.
NHA's letter
In response to this, L.S. Changsan, Chief Executive Officer of the National Health Authority (NHA) that is the implementing agency for AB PM-JAY, said the additional premium for existing beneficiary families determined at ₹75.7 per family per annum covers the additional top-up wallet of ₹5 lakh, which is utilised only after the primary wallet of the family is exhausted. For new beneficiary families, the annual premium of ₹1,052 per family aligns with the existing premium structure under AB PM-JAY, the NHA CEO's letter stated.
'Based on the consultations with States in July 2024 and the inputs received subsequently, the principles for tagging are being finalised. The identification of existing families and new families will be done based on these principles. However, the State may start providing the services to the Ayushman Vay Vandana card holders and tagging activity will be completed before fund release proposals for the ABVV are due,' the letter said.
No definitive mechanism
However, Karnataka's Finance Department has not agreed to this. 'In the absence of any definite mechanism to link the AB-ArK beneficiaries with the actual SECC data, as per the next best approximation worked out by the State Health Department, Karnataka will require a total of ₹68.98 crore per annum for the senior citizens scheme. As the Centre has to provide 60% of this amount to the State, Karnataka is entitled to get ₹36.58 crore from the Centre. We are now planning to place this issue before the State Cabinet for further discussion,' Mr. Harsh Gupta told The Hindu.
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