Maharashtra considers PPP model for public hospitals in tribal belt: Minister

The Maharashtra government is considering plans to run some public hospitals in tribal areas in partnership with private operators to overhaul the struggling rural healthcare system, state health minister Prakash Abitkar said on Monday.Maharashtra health minister Prakash Abitkar announced the deployment of portable counterfeit drug-detection devices to perform on-the-spot quality screenings of medicines at government healthcare facilities across the state in Mumbai. (Anshuman Poyrekar/HT File Photo)Abitkar declined to specify how many hospitals may be run in public-private partnership (PPP), saying the move was proposed against the backdrop of unsuccessful attempts to raise the standard of medical care in rural hospitals despite orders from the Bombay High Court.“When we faced criticism from the Bombay HC for not having specialists in the rural hospitals in the tribal belt, we did post specialists in our rural hospitals as per their orders,” he said.However, he said, doctor attendance remained a serious concern. “Doctors would be available for four days a week and then simply be absent,” he lamented, referring to a petition being heard by the high court since 2007 that sought orders to improve the quality of healthcare for women and children in the state.The high court had also directed health department officials to visit the tribal Melghat region to assess the situation on the ground. After this exercise, the health department told the court that the state was planning a tribal-first policy under which all government doctors would have to serve in a tribal area. The state also introduced a hardship allowance for medical staff working in extremely interior and difficult areas.Maharashtra has 16 designated tribal districts (Scheduled Areas) out of the state’s 36 districts.Abitkar said certain private initiatives in tribal belts were doing really well, and the government proposed trying similar development models in a few of its own hospitals too.The Maharashtra government introduced a PPP policy in February 2026, saying it aimed to enhance collaboration between the public and private sectors to accelerate infrastructure and development projects and service delivery across sectors in the state.Activists have criticised the proposal to outsource health facilities in the tribal belt to private players. “There are 16 tribal districts of Maharashtra where access to healthcare services remains poor, with inadequate healthcare personnel, lack of medicine and services and a poor network of healthcare centres. Instead of privatising tertiary care centres in this belt, the government should focus on strengthening its own health network and ensure improved delivery of basic services here,” an activist said on condition of anonymity.