The WHO report said the other Indian cities that registered very high PM2.5 levels and constituted the top 14 were Kanpur, Faridabad, Gaya, Patna, Agra, Muzaffarpur, Srinagar, Gurgaon, Jaipur, Patiala and Jodhpur.

“As an extension of the central government’s Ayushman Bharat scheme,we are in the process of identifying two community health centres in each district. Their land, about three acres each, will be given on a long-term lease to private company which will construct a 100-bed hospital, along with an operation theatre and diagnostic centre,” he said. The project is likely to begin from November this year.

“We want all the participating players including insurers, hospitals and other health care providers to have moderate amount of profit but not brutal profiteering at the cost of state exchequer.I think for this mission to be successful it has to be viable business and the intent is that we should have package rates and costing which is fair for the health sector as a whole and it is fair national exchequer,’’ said Paul  

Highly customisable health insurance plan covering upto 19 members in a family with individual sum insured for each member and a floater sum insured that can be used by any one or more of the family members within the overall sum insured. It covers 11 Critical Illness, Maternity Benefit, Emergency Domestic Evacuation, Vaccination in case of Animal Bite and Health & Wellness

Under the Ayushman Bharat Scheme, the government will open 1.5 lakh health and wellness centre by 2022, which will be equipped to treat host of diseases, including blood pressure, diabetes, cancer and old-age illness

“we want to encourage investment in the preventive and promotive (healthcare) sector. We see the private sector as strategic partners in our endeavour to provide universal healthcare,” the minister said.

The Ayushman Bharat has twin missions. First, creating a network of Health and Wellness Centres to deliver comprehensive primary healthcare close to the community, and second, providing insurance cover to 40 per cent of India’s population, that is most deprived, for secondary and tertiary care including for instance, hospitalization costs.