From: S Ketharaman [s.ketharaman@gtm360.com]
Sent: Thursday, August 15, 2013 11:31 PM
To: ‘editet@timesgroup.com’
Subject: Mera Bharat Mahan! | Letter to the Editor
Dear Editor of The Economic Times:
Kudos to Ms. Rama Bijapurkar for her brilliant article “Of Course We Have, and Here’s to Much More” carried in today’s Economic Times.
I’ve lived abroad almost half my working career of over 25 years in countries like Oman, Germany and UK. I’ve always had the option of settling down overseas but I always chose to return to India because, as Ms. Bijapurkar says, I “love this crazy, flawed, impossibly hard-to-deal-with-land of ours”.
Apart from The Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan, Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, NREGA and the other public service programs mentioned by Ms. Bijapurkar, I want to call out the revolution of sorts in Indian healthcare.
A year ago, my father was admitted to the ICU of Jehangir Hospital in Pune. As his “attendant”, I’d to spend extended hours in the waiting room just outside. Almost 75% of the people there were from the lower strata of the society. If they were able to admit their family members to one of the most premium hospitals in the city, and that too, in the high cost ICU, it’s only because of the support they were getting from the government. While my father was a “full fare paying” patient, I was reassured that my tax Rupees were being put to good use by the government in providing quality healthcare to the weaker sections of the society.
While I’ll always “rave and rant about what we can do better”, we must give credit where credit is due.
Jai Hind!
Thanks and Regards.
Ketharaman Swaminathan