Hard Bargain With Banks on Health and Accident Covers Paid Off to State

Hyderabad:The state government has pulled off the cashless healthcare and accidental insurance for its employees and pensioners, thanks to the hard bargaining it made with public sector banks.

Deputy Chief Minister Mallu Bhatti Vikramarka made a grand announcement on cashless treatment, fulfilling the long-pending demand of employees in his budget speech.

Explaining the modalities of implementing the scheme, the Deputy Chief Minister, who also handles the finance portfolio, told Deccan Chronicle that the government would not spend a single rupee from the exchequer but would successfully implement the scheme.

“It is all about financial management,” he quipped. The state government keeps deposits of thousands of crores of rupees in banks either directly or through different corporations. Besides, the government also routes employees’ salaries through public sector banks, giving huge financial advantage to the banks, Bhatti Vikramarka pointed out.

The finance managers made a hard bargain with banks and even entered into an MoU according to which the latter would bear the cost of insurance premiums for extending the cashless healthcare and accidental insurance. Bhatti Vikramarka, in his capacity as energy minister, implemented the initiative on an experimental basis in Singareni Colleries and the energy department, giving confidence to the government to extend the facility to all its employees.

The cashless scheme is expected to cover 5.19 lakh government employees and 2.38 lakh pensioners. The treatment will be free of cost in all government and 652 empanelled hospitals covering nearly 2000 medical procedures. About the accidental insurance, kin of the employee will get Rs 1.2 crore in the event of his/her accidental death and `10 lakh in case of natural death of employees up to 60 years.