Ayushman Bharath, the health insurance initiative, has turned out to be “unhealthy” for Centre-State relations as the TRS in Telangana opted out of the nationally rolled out scheme by PM Narendra Modi on Monday. While TRS said it offers Arogyasri which is far superior to Ayushman Bharat, state BJP leader Bandaru Dattathreya pooh-poohed Arogyasri and said no major corporate hospital honoured the Arogyasri and the coverage was a measly Rs 2 lakh against the Rs 5 lakh health coverage under Ayushman Bharath scheme.
The tweet war between the BJP and the TRS on extending health insurance coverage to the poorest of the poor turned out to be an all out showdown betw-een BJP national president Amit Shah and TRS front man K.T. Rama Rao.
On Monday, Mr Shah tweeted that the Telangana state had denied its people the benefits of the Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana scheme launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Shah said the scheme was not being implemented to serve Telangana Rashtra Samiti (TRS) Government’s selfish interests. Mr Rama Rao responded to the BJP president’s tweet by calling the state’s Arogyasri program as better than the Central scheme.
In his tweet, Mr Shah said, “Ayushman Bharat scheme brought by Mr Modi is considered the biggest and greatest initiative in the healthcare sector in the world. It is unfortunate that the Telangana Government is not willing to come forward to implement this scheme and denying the benefit of this noble scheme to the people in Telangana.”
