NHA and ITC e-Choupal sign MoU to raise awareness on Ayushman Bharat amongst farmers in rural areas

The National Health Authority (NHA) has signed an MoU with ITC e-Choupal to enable farmers across the country to avail benefits under Ayushman Bharat PM-JAY. Through this collaboration, NHA and ITC e-Choupal will spread awareness about AB PM-JAY scheme and conduct outreach and training activities. Implemented by NHA along with its state counterparts, AB PM-JAY, is India’s flagship public health insurance/assurance scheme, and the world’s largest publicly-funded health assurance scheme.

The MoU was signed by Dr Praveen Gedam, Deputy CEO, NHA and Anil K Rajput, Senior Vice President — Corporate Affairs, ITC in the presence of Dr Indu Bhushan, CEO, NHA.

The two organisations have come together to spread awareness about the AB PM-JAY to help eligible farmers have a better understanding of the scheme and seek hospital treatment for serious illnesses through it. Through this partnership, millions of farmers would be able to access the information via 6,000 e-Choupals.

E-choupal means ‘village meeting place’ will constitute a network of rural kiosks, providing number of information and communication-related services for rural population.

Speaking about the collaboration, Dr Indu Bhushan, CEO, National Health Authority, said, “This partnership between National Health Authority and ITC e-Choupal, will empower millions of citizens in the rural India and Indian farmers with digital interventions. The collaboration focusses on providing secondary and tertiary treatment for a range of serious illnesses like cancer, heart ailments, etc to farmers and their families in rural areas. It will also demonstrate how such innovative models can reach the remotest corners of the country.”

Sharing his views, Anil K Rajput, Senior Vice President, Corporate Affairs, ITC, said, “The partnership with the National Health Authority will help to improve the health scenario in rural India. E-chaupal will empower farmers in the hinterland by providing necessary information through an integrated network. Signing of MoU will help pave the way to quality curative care for farmers and all citizens outside urban centers.

As part of the MoU, ITC will conduct awareness camps through 400 Village Health Champions (VHCs) covering nearly 800+ villages across 10 districts of Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh on a pilot basis. These VHCs will make women and adolescents aware of the programme through group meetings and door-to-door connect. ITC will also promote AB PM-JAY thorugh 23 Choupal Saagars and 18 fuel stations. NHA will provide training modules and kits to train VHCs and Choupal Sanchalaks, who will in turn, raise awareness about the scheme among farmers and their families.

ITC e-Choupal is a network of 4four million farmers in over 35,000 villages across 10 states (Madhya Pradesh, Haryana, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu) in the country.