Amaravati, Sep 5 (IANS) Former Chief Minister and YSRCP President YS Jagan Mohan Reddy on Friday accused Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu of ‘looting’ public assets by privatising government medical colleges and dismantling the free healthcare scheme Arogyasri.

He alleged that Chandrababu Naidu turned cabinet meetings into platforms for decisions that benefit commissions and cronies, instead of the people.

In a post on X, YS Jagan said that Andhra Pradesh had only 11 government medical colleges till 2019. Despite serving as Chief Minister three times, Naidu did not establish even one new government medical college. In contrast, during YSRCP’s five years, 17 new medical colleges were sanctioned. Out of these, five were already completed with classes started, and admissions were held in one more after the elections. If the coalition government had taken forward the work responsibly, 12 new colleges would have been running by now, said the YSR Congress Party chief.

YS Jagan pointed out that when YSRCP came to power, Andhra Pradesh had only 2,360 MBBS seats. With the new colleges, an additional 2,550 seats were being created, almost doubling the total to 4,910. Nearly 800 seats were already filled after YSRCP completed the first set of colleges. These colleges were designed to provide half the seats free of cost and the remaining at much lower fees compared to private colleges, ensuring accessibility to poor and middle-class families.

YS Jagan accused Chandrababu Naidu of conspiring to block approvals and admissions, including writing to the National Medical Council against Pulivendula Medical College. “When parents are forced to sell their assets to send children abroad for MBBS seats in countries like Ukraine, Russia, and the Philippines, why is Naidu destroying the opportunity to study in Andhra Pradesh at an affordable cost?” he asked.

On healthcare, YS Jagan alleged that the coalition has deliberately weakened Arogyasri. In the last 15 months, out of nearly Rs 4,500 crore due to network hospitals, only Rs 600 crore was released, leaving dues of about Rs 4,000 crore. The scheme, which covered 3,257 procedures free of cost up to Rs 25 lakh per family, was abandoned. Even the “Arogyasri Aasara” benefit that provided Rs 5,000 per month to patients during recovery was stopped, with dues of nearly Rs 600 crore left unpaid.

He said Naidu is now shifting the responsibility to private insurance companies and misleading people through false propaganda. “If the government itself could not spend Rs 3,600 crore for Arogyasri, how will it spend over Rs 5,000 crore on premiums for private insurance? This is only another scam in the making,” YS Jagan warned while reacting to the decision taken by the Cabinet to implement a universal health policy to provide free healthcare to all.

YS Jagan further said that private insurers work for profit and cannot be compared with a government scheme that provided free treatment even during COVID-19. “In future health emergencies, people will be left helpless as private insurance will not cover new diseases. Naidu’s decisions are aimed only at handing over public money to his associates under the guise of premium payments,” he charged.

–IANS

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