Will Governments pay heed to sane advice?

Hyderabad: Two well-experienced and highly placed dignitaries, the former Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu and the Chief Justice of India Justice Chandrachud have made very timely and significant observations that merit the immediate and serious attention of the governments in the States and at the Centre.

Firstly, the Chief Justice had expressed his concern, on August 10 in Chandigarh, that with the entry of private sector into healthcare in the 1980s, medical services in the country have turned into business. "The cost of many medicines has gone up to unbearable levels. As much as 77 per cent income of the rural population and 70 per cent income of people in urban areas is going towards medical expenses," he lamented and stressed the need for the medical colleges and the authorities to ensure that better medical and health services are made available in rural and urban areas at affordable cost. This is their social responsibility, he asserted. The Chief Justice also said while it is appreciable that Bharat has become an innovation centre, it is painful that the fruits of the same are confined only to a few.

A day later, Venkaiah Naidu stressed, at a meeting in Krishna district, that the governments should stop freebies, and provide free education and free medical services to the people. If the governments offered free education and free medical services, there is no need for other freebies. He stated that for getting votes in the elections, the political parties are offering needless freebies.

It is, however, a matter of irony that none of the political parties in the country have thought it fit to respond to sane (sage) advice, in any manner. As a matter of fact, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had, sometime back, strongly opposed the freebies culture and asserted that the tax-payers totally resented their hard-earned money being splurged away as freebies. The PM had, however, changed his stance on freebies with a view to reaping political mileage in the State Assembly and Lok Sabha elections.

Now that the election fever is almost over, the State and the Union governments would do well to concentrate on providing free education and medical services and slowly do away with the freebies culture. Taking the sane advice of the two dignitaries, the prime minister and the leaders in the States should initiate steps to go in for free education and medical services to the people, particularly the poor, social analysts feel.