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India slashes health budget & HIV/AIDS funds, already world’s lowest

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A paramedic distributes free medicine provided by the government to patients inside a ward at RGGGH in Chennai

A paramedic distributes free medicine provided by the government to patients inside a ward at RGGGH in Chennai


In addition to the healthcare budget, the finance ministry has also ordered a spending cut for India’s HIV/AIDS programme by about 30 percent to 13 billion rupees ($205.4 million). India had the third-largest number of people living with HIV in the world at the end of 2013.

The government has ordered a cut of nearly 20 percent in its 2014/15 healthcare budget due to fiscal strains, putting at risk key disease control initiatives in a country whose public spending on health is already among the lowest in the world.

Two health ministry officials stated on Tuesday that more than 60 billion rupees, or $948 million, has been slashed from their budget allocation of around $5 billion for the financial year ending on March 31.

Despite rapid economic growth over the past two decades, successive governments have kept a tight rein on healthcare expenditure. India spends about 1 percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on public health, compared to 3 percent in China and 8.3 percent in the United States.

But hopes were high that Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was elected in May, would upgrade basic health infrastructure and make medical services more affordable for the poor.

The United Nations estimates about one third of the world’s 1.2 billion poorest people live in India.

“We were not expecting (budget cuts) this time because of the commitments they made in the manifesto,” one of the health ministry officials said, referring to Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). “No reason was given … but there is shortage of funds. It is not rocket science.”

The officials requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

The finance ministry, which ordered the spending reduction and overruled objections from the health ministry at a recent meeting, did not respond immediately to requests for comment.

The move reflects the government’s struggle to achieve its 2014/15 fiscal deficit target of 4.1 percent of GDP.

Dominated by private players, India’s healthcare industry is growing at an annual clip of around 15 percent, but public spending has remained low and resulted in a dilapidated network of government hospitals and clinics, especially in rural areas.

One of the health ministry officials said the cut could crimp efforts to control the spread of diseases. More newborns die in India than in poorer neighbours such as Bangladesh, and preventable illnesses such as diarrhoea kill more than a million children every year.

The retrenchment could also derail an ambitious universal healthcare programme that Modi wants to launch in April. The plan aims to provide all citizens with free drugs and diagnostic treatments, as well as insurance benefits.

The cost of that programme over the next four years had been estimated at 1.6 trillion rupees ($25 billion). The health ministry officials had been expecting a jump in their budget for the coming year, in part to pay for this extra cost.

“Even next year we don’t think we’ll get a huge amount of money,” said one official, adding that it was now unclear how the new programme would be funded.

HIV/AIDS FUNDS SLASHED

In addition to the healthcare budget, the finance ministry has also ordered a spending cut for India’s HIV/AIDS programme by about 30 percent to 13 billion rupees ($205.4 million).

India had the third-largest number of people living with HIV in the world at the end of 2013, according to the U.N. AIDS programme, and it accounts for more than half of all AIDS-related deaths in the Asia-Pacific.

In October, India was on the brink of running out of a critical medicine in its free HIV/AIDS drugs programme due to bureaucratic delays. A crisis was averted with the assistance of pharmaceutical companies and global health organisations.

Still, health activists complain about dire shortages of several HIV/AIDS diagnostic kits.

“We are all in shock. That shows the kind of importance the government attaches to public health,” said Leena Menghaney, a New Delhi-based public health activist. “This will undermine the HIV programme in the long run.”

Credit: Reuters

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Shimla City – Private Bus Operators Seen Creating Nuisance by Blocking Road

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Shimla-In yet another instance, two private bus operators in Shimla city were seen creating a nuisance for the public by jamming the traffic. A reader clicked some pictures at the BCS bust stop in Shimla city on February 19, 2022, at about 8 PM and shared them with us. The reader alleged that two private bus operators, namely ‘Komal’ and ‘Chadda’, indulged in a verbal spat, most probably over their schedule. While the drivers argued, one of the buses remained parked in the middle of the road, choking the traffic. The staff of these two buses indulged in a verbal spat for about 5-10 minutes during which the general public faced a huge inconvenience. The reader has requested the Traffic Police Shimla to take action against such operators and discourage them from adopting such a bullying attitude that they don’t even hesitate to block the entire road.

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If you have relevant issues/complains that you want the people and the government to see and read about, you can publish blogs on Himachal Watcher. Send us your blogs with pictures/videos at editor [at] himachalwatcher [dot]com

Language: Hindi and English

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Littering – A Grave Threat to Sundernagar Lake and Its Aquatic Life

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sundernagar lake littering

Sundernagar-Many people visit the Sundernagar lake in Mandi district and litter along the road. Winds carry all those packets and plastic bottles into the lake. This practice of littering is unlawful because it costs millions in clean-up projects. It portrays a bad picture of an area. Littering is a huge threat to the aquatic life too. In my view, the solution is awareness, responsibility, sensibility and concern for nature. We as a society need to play a big role. At least, dustbins should be installed along the lake. Otherwise, the negligence in the present will affect us in near future.

-Blog and Picture By Divya Acharya, Sundernagar

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If you have relevant issues/complains that you want the people and the government to see and read about, you can publish blogs on Himachal Watcher. Send us your blogs with pictures/videos at editor [at] himachalwatcher [dot]com

Language: Hindi and English

Note For Multimedia Files: If you have high resolution images/videos (taken with smartphone/camera), then send us the originals through Google Drive or We Transfer or any other file sharing applications that suits you.

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Shimla-Based IT Start-Up Scaling Global Market in Short Span of Time

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Shimla based it company netgen solution

Shimla-A youth from a small town of the Mandi district – Sarkaghat- started as a freelancer and went on to launch his own start-up in 2014. By 2021, the start-up grew into a company that has garnered international clients  and also designed and developed websites and web apps for several Departments of the Himachal Pradesh Government.   

Netgen IT Solutions Pvt Ltd- a young agile company- has, so far, developed websites for the Department of Information Technology,  Women & Child Development, Rope & Rapid Transport Development Corporation, HP Milk Federation Cooperation,  and the HP AIDS Control Society.

Besides, it also developed  HimSuraksha Abhiyan App (National Health Mission) and the website of the Department of Tourism & Civil Aviation along with a  Services Portal.

Further, the website of the Department of Information & Public Relations and the single window system was also developed by NetGen.

Having developed over 2500 websites, Netgen IT Solutions has an imprint of having worked for clients spread over 25 countries in Europe, America, Asia and Australia.

Bootstrapped as a Start-Up on 7th July 2014, the company has evolved to offer a diverse set of services for web, e-commerce and mobile solutions that have enabled Global and Indian business to adapt to a Digital First environment. In seven years, this Shimla-based company has carved out a niche for itself.

The company started with a small team of just four people, and today it employs strong-heeled 25 IT professionals. The skillset of web developers, designers, networking specialists, social media marketers and others is expanding with the growth of the company.

To mark the NetGen Foundation Day, the company hosted a live inter-action of the team members with some clients to understand the need for future technologies and solutions for a fast-changing business environment in the shadow COVID pandemic.

Mr Rajneesh Rana, Founder and Managing Director of the company, is a computer science graduate. Speaking about the company’s journey, Rana’s says, “Stepping out from working as a freelancer at the small township of Sarkhaghat, in Himachal Pradesh, to launching a start-up company, was my first step in entrepreneurship. The company was founded on a shoe-string budget with a small capital outlay. After overcoming the initial hesitancy, we’re on the firmer ground today.”

With the growth in demand for IT Services, the company in the initial year faced manpower shortages. The management took to train and equip freshers in a mentorship program to meet its needs for IT Professionals and also to equip others to find gainful employment elsewhere. Netgen till date has trained over 50 freshers with essential and advanced IT skills. Most of them for the first time in their careers got exposure to the IT Industry.

The company’s IT Technical Team today is professionally equipped to work in 20+ technologies that can be deployed across a vast network of industries. 

The Netgen team of IT professionals has expanded the services that the company now provides. A multitude of projects employing creative website design-development; customised software products; e-Commerce solutions; server administration – web security – networking services; mobile application design – development; social media marketing; stand completed.

“There is a growing demand for many other IT and IT-enabled services that the company has successfully delivered for Global and Indian clients,” said Rajneesh. 

“Since the breakout of the COVID pandemic, the demand for online services has increased. It created an environment that demands moving things onto digital platform, bringing more opportunities for the IT sector ,” added Rajneesh.  

“Take the case of the Government of Himachal Pradesh, India. To secure baseline health data of the over 70 lakh residents in the state and to prepare effective strategies for countering the spread of the pandemic in challenging hilly terrain, the state government needed a simple but effective IT-enabled solution to capture the data as fast as possible,” he said.   

“The ‘Him Suraksha Abhiyan’ application designed and developed by NetGen IT Solutions was used by thousands of teams spread under 2300+ sub-centres. In just over a month, the software solution created successfully captured the data of over 68 lakh residents of Himachal Pradesh,” he added.

The 70:30 Percent (%) Global – Domestic revenue stream of Netgen has prepared the company to expand both its export and domestic service portfolios, said Rajneesh. 

Mr Ravinder Makhaik, Director of the company says, “growing steadily, Netgen is a debt-free, profit-making company. A healthy mix of domestic and international businesses, with sound financials, gives the company strength to take up more challenging projects. Our portfolio of government projects is making good progress.”

Founded as a 1 lakh authorized capital company and with annual revenues rising at a 25 % compounded annual growth rate, the Netgen Board of Directors has decided to expand the authorized capital of the company to Rs 10 lakh to meet future growth needs.

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