New Delhi, Oct 30: Former Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party national convenor, Arvind Kejriwal hit back at Prime Minister Narendra Modi's criticism of the Delhi government over not implementing the Ayushman Bharat scheme and said it was wrong of him to politicize public health issues.
"It is not right to speak wrongly on the issue of people's health. It is not right to do politics on this," said Arvind Kejriwal in a post on X. Kejriwal's remarks came after Prime Minister Modi criticized the Delhi and West Bengal governments for failing to implement the Ayushman Bharat health insurance scheme out of "political interests."
Notably, Delhi and West Bengal are among the states where the Centre's Ayushman Bharat Yojna is not implemented.
The Ayushman Bharat Yojana is a scheme that aims to procure free access to health insurance coverage for families with low incomes. The scheme was launched in 2018 by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare.
In response, the former Chief Minister claimed that lakhs of people in Delhi get free medical treatment under the scheme of the Delhi government.
Taking to his social media X handle, Kejriwal posted, "Under the Delhi government's scheme, every person living in Delhi gets complete treatment free of cost no matter how much it costs - from a pill worth five rupees to a treatment worth one crore, the Delhi government provides complete treatment to every person free of cost. If you tell me, I will send you the names of lakhs of people who have benefited from this. Did people benefit from the Ayushman Bharat Yojana?"
He further alleged that many 'irregularities' were found in the Ayushman Bharat Yojana, and took a jibe at Prime Minister Modi, asking him to "study" the Delhi Model.
