EXIM, ADB in race to lend Rs 500 cr to Health City

The Export-Import Bank of India (EXIM Bank) and Asian Development Bank (ADB), besides a clutch of other global and Indian financial institutions, are understood to be in the race to lend around Rs 500 crore for expansion plans of Bangalore-based Narayana Hrudayalaya.

Dr Devi Shetty, founder of Narayana Hrudayalaya, recently embarked on a mega expansion plan to build health cities across five locations in India which will cumulatively have 5,000 beds specialising in various healthcare segments.

According to sources, the discussion for debt is at various stages and is expected to be finalised within the next quarter. Earlier this month, AIG and J P Morgan cumulatively committed Rs 400 crore equity to this project for a 25 per cent stake.

Narayana Hrudayalaya currently owns three hospitals across Bangalore and Kolkata with a total bed capacity of 2,500 and with the planned expansion of the health city project the capacity is expected to cross the 20,000 mark in five years.

Besides the hospital in Bangalore, the health city will also accommodate a teaching institute for cardiologists, cardiac surgeons, cardiac anaesthetists, nurses, health technicians and healthcare specialists.

In addition to the project in Bangalore, Narayana Hrudayalaya is planning health cities in Jaipur and Ahmedabad, besides expanding its Kolkata unit and enhancing a hospital in Jamshedpur.

Presently, Narayana Hrudayalaya runs nine primary healthcare centres, has taken over nine more of the Government of Arunachal Pradesh and is building 16 primary health centres at Amethi in Uttar Pradesh.

Sources further indicate that Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, chairman and managing director of Biocon Limited is understood to have committed a Rs 50 crore equity into this project and will be focussing on the speciality cancer unit.

The Bangalore Health city will include cardiac, orthopaedics, eye care, neurology, child & women care besides cancer care.

Apart from its specialities, with the help of ISRO, Narayana Hrudayalaya has been playing a pioneering role in telemedicine.

Narayana Hrudayalaya was started in 2001 by Dr Devi Shetty under the aegis of the Asian Heart Foundation.

Devi Shetty, through his initiatives, has been bringing down the cost of cardiac surgeries through what he fondly calls the 'Wal-martisation of healthcare', by performing close to 30 open heart surgeries and almost an equal number of catheterisation procedures a day, which is eight times the average at other Indian hospitals.