Growth-oriented budget: Health Minister Dr Sudhakar

The first budget of Amrit Kaal presented by Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman is futuristic, growth-oriented, and has laid a strong foundation for India@100 in 2047. The Budget has focussed on every sector and will benefit every section of society giving an impetus to the Aatmanibhar Bharat vision.

"I thank PM Modi and Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman for central assistance of Rs 5,300 crore for the Upper Bhadra Project. This will immensely benefit the people of Chikkamagaluru, Chitradurga, Tumkur, and Davangere districts by providing irrigation facilities to farmers and recharging the groundwater table to provide drinking water in drought-prone taluks of these districts".

The Economic Survey 2023 tabled in the Parliament on Tuesday showed that the central and state governments' budgeted expenditure in the health sector reached 2.1 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in 2022- 23.

This is in the direction of the vision of National Health Policy - 2017, which has envisaged increasing the government's health expenditure to 2.5 percent of GDP by 2025. The share of the government's health expenditure in total health outlay has increased from 28.6 percent in 2014 to 40.6 percent in 2019.

Thanks to Ayushman Bharat, the out-ofpocket expenditure (OOPE) as a share of total health expenditure has come down to 48.2 percent in 2019 from 64.2 percent in 2014. The budget proposal to establish one hundred and fifty-seven new nursing colleges in co-location with the existing 157 medical colleges established since 2014 is a welcome move to address the increasing human resource needs in the healthcare sector. The mission to eliminate Sickle Cell Anaemia by 2047.