8.99 crore hospital admissions worth Rs 1.26 lakh crore authorised under PMJAY

New Delhi: The Ayushman Bharat - Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY) has enabled about 8.99 crore hospital admissions, with an overall spending of roughly Rs 1.26 lakh crore up to March 1, 2025 revaled Union Minister of Health and Family Welfare Shri Jagat Prakash Nadda in a written reply to Lok Sabha recently.

AB-PMJAY provides free healthcare access up to Rs. 5 lakh per eligible beneficiary family annually for secondary and tertiary care hospitalization in 27 medical specialties corresponding to 1961 procedures. Regular updation, such as inclusion of new procedures, empanelment of new hospitals, inclusion of new beneficiaries and other improvements, is done in the scheme as per new requirements from time to time.

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Under AB-PMJAY, a network of over 30,957 hospitals has been empanelled to provide healthcare services to the beneficiaries. This includes 13,866 private hospitals.

The Minister shared these details after parliament member Shri Charanjit Singh Channi sought to know whether the Government has information on expenditure incurred in various States under Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY), whether the Government has any plan to increase the insurance coverage under the said scheme in future and whether the Government has any plan to empanel all private hospitals under the said scheme in future.

Responding to these queries, Jagat Prakash said, "As public health is a State subject, the responsibility of empaneling hospitals under AB-PMJAY lies with the respective State/UT. Also, hospital empanelment is a continuous process and is undertaken based on the requirements and availability of healthcare providers (meeting ABPMJAY criteria) within a given State / UT. The Government of India encourages States/UTs to empanel more hospitals under the scheme to ensure access to quality healthcare to all eligible beneficiaries."

Medical Dialogues had previously reported that a total outstanding amount of Rs 1,21,61,45,63,617 (₹1.21 lakh crore) remained unpaid to empanelled hospitals under the Ayushman Bharat scheme (AB-PMJAY), with more than 63 lakh pending claims yet to be cleared, revealed the data shared by the National Health Authority (NHA) in response to a Right to Information (RTI) application.

The RTI query, filed by Mr. Ajay Basudev Bose, sought details regarding the statistical details of the total pending amount owed to hospitals empanelled under the Ayushman Bharat Yojana scheme.

In response to the RTI, the NHA disclosed that a total of 63,89,517 claims remain uncleared, and these pending claims led to a staggering amount of Rs 1,21,61,45,63,617 (Rs 1.21 lakh crore) remaining as outstanding dues to empanelled hospitals, leaving these hospitals in financial distress.

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