The Post-Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), Chandigarh, Friday resumed attending to patients from Punjab under the Ayushman Bharat scheme with immediate effect following a directive from Centre, five days after the premier institute had put a halt to the facility after the state government allegedly failed to clear dues of more than Rs 15 crore.
“The institute has taken this decision on the directives from the Prime Minister’s and Union Health Minister’s offices to restart the programme so that the patients do not suffer,” said Kumar Gaurav Dhawan, Deputy Director (Administration) and official spokesperson, PGIMER.
Dhawan said they have received a communication from the Secretary Health, Government of Punjab, stating that all pending dues will be cleared in the next few days.
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PGIMER’s Director Prof Vivek Lal said though the Punjab government has still not cleared the pending dues, they have again started treating patients under the Ayushman Bharat scheme after a directive from the Centre.
“We had sent repeated requests to the Punjab government that their dues are not settled, but despite written reminders, we did not get any response after which we were forced to temporarily suspend the facility,” Prof Lal told the media.
The institute stopped treating patients from Punjab under the central scheme from August 1 after state did not clear more than Rs 15 crore in pending dues under the insurance scheme. However, patients from Punjab continued to seek treatment at the institute as routine patients by paying the user charges or under other applicable welfare schemes.
The Ayushman Bharat scheme provides cashless treatment of up to Rs 5 lakh to a family per year whose cost of implementation is shared by the state government.
The institute, in a statement, said that before taking the decision to stop the treatment facility, it had brought the matter to the notice of the national and state health authorities on April 1, May 13, and June 7. “Later the matter was even brought to the attention of senior officers of the Punjab government,” read the statement.
On average, around 1,400 patients from Punjab avail treatment every month under the scheme, sources said.
Dhawan said, “For the institute, patient care is the top priority. We have restarted extending the benefits of Ayushman Bharat scheme to beneficiaries from Punjab from today so that they do not suffer. We earnestly request the competent authorities to address the issue at the earliest to enable us to sustain our decision taken only in the interest of our patients’ well-being.”
Yashpal Garg, Secretary Health, UT Chandigarh, has clarified that patients from Punjab will be accepted under the Ayushmann Bharat scheme for treatment at the hospitals of Chandigarh Administration from Monday.
The status of outstanding dues will be reviewed after 15 days.
In May, Government Medical College and Hospital in Sector 32, a tertiary care hospital, had halted treatment provided under the scheme to patients coming from Punjab after the state failed to release a payment of Rs 2.2 crore to it under the Ayushman Bharat scheme.
This week, Principal Secretary (Health) Ajoy Sharma had told The Indian Express that the Finance Department would soon release an amount of Rs 100 crore and the dues of PGI and other hospitals would be cleared.
Opposition parties including Congress had also hit out at the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)-led government for not clearing the pending dues.