The Budget reframes healthcare as a strategic national capability, backing biopharma innovation, workforce expansion and technology-led governance to power India’s next growth phase, says Sangita Reddy.

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Key Points

• Healthcare is now seen as a national strength, not just welfare.
• ₹10,000 crore Biopharma mission to fight long-term diseases like cancer and diabetes.
• Focus shifts from treating illness to predicting and managing health.
• 100,000 allied health workers to be trained in new medical roles.
• Five regional medical hubs will link hospitals, research, and education.

Healthcare as National Capability

The Budget reflects a quiet but consequential shift: From viewing healthcare primarily as social infrastructure to recognising it as strategic national capability.

For a nation aspiring to Viksit Bharat, that distinction matters.

What stands out is not a single announcement, but an integrated architecture for growth.

The government is signalling that the next phase of India’s healthcare journey will be powered by accelerated innovation, cutting-edge governance, and purposeful technology development, not by incremental capacity additions alone.

The proposed Rs 10,000 crore Biopharma Shakti mission over five years exemplifies this shift.

Science-Driven Disease Control

At a time when nearly 60 per cent of deaths in India are caused by non-communicable diseases, the country must move beyond a system designed mainly for episodic acute care.

Chronic disease management requires advanced biologics, precision therapies, and continuous scientific discovery.

Building India’s Health Workforce

By strengthening domestic biopharmaceutical research and manufacturing, India is positioning itself not merely as a producer of medicines, but as a creator of next-generation therapies. This is industrial policy with clinical intent.** **

Growth, however, is only as strong as the people who deliver it. The proposal to introduce 10 new allied health disciplines and train 100,000 allied health professionals over the next five years recognises that healthcare transformation is, at its core, a human enterprise.

This investment expands care capacity, while simultaneously creating a large, future-ready workforce.

For a country with one of the world’s youngest populations, healthcare becomes both a growth sector and a nation-building platform.

AI with Rules, Not Risks

Technology development forms the third pillar of the Budget’s healthcare vision.

The announcement of a high-powered panel to assess the impact of artificial intelligence on the services sector signals an important governance choice: Emerging technologies will be shaped through proactive policy rather than reactive regulation. That approach matters.

Medical Hubs for Innovation

Equally significant is the proposal to establish five regional medical hubs integrating care, research, and education.

These hubs create physical anchors for innovation ecosystems – places where clinicians, scientists, engineers, and entrepreneurs work in proximity. Such clustering is how cutting-edge industries mature.

Taken together, these measures point to a healthcare model designed for speed, scale, and resilience. Predictive rather than reactive.

• Union Budget 2026

Sangita Reddy is joint managing director, Apollo Hospitals.

Feature Presentation: Rajesh Alva/Rediff