Singapore minister lauds Aadhaar, calls India world's most dynamic economy

India has emerged as one of the world's most-dynamic economies, developing at a great pace and keeping at the forefront of technology and social innovation, Singapore's health minister has said.

Speaking at the 70th Republic Day reception on Thursday night, Health Minister Gan Kim Yong recaptured the strong ties between India and Singapore, which began with India being among the first countries to recognise island country's independence in 1965. This year marks the 54th year of diplomatic relations between the two countries.

"Today, India has emerged as one of the world's most-dynamic economies, developing at a great pace and keeping at the forefront of technology and social innovation while preserving its rich heritage.

"Singapore has always believed in India's expansion and we're heartened to see India rapidly advancing and contributing to the region and the world at large," Gan said.

The minister built on the strong cooperation founded on deep common interests and shared values between the two countries and the high-level exchange of visits by the two countries' prime ministers last year.

These high-level interactions have prompted significant stride in the two countries' strategic partnership, especially in trade and investment, defence, smart cities, connectivity and skills development, he elaborated.

"We have identified fintech innovation as new pillar of our strategic partnership and under this pillar we launched efforts to promote interoperability between our payment systems," Gan said of the RuPay and Singapore's Network for Electronic Transfers.

Gan highlighted the scope to expand cooperation in digital technologies to other sectors such as health care, building on the ongoing cooperation in technologies between the two countries.

He noted that India's success in implementing Aadhaar, which, he says, has opened up many possibilities to expand health services to citizens from patient registration to digitising medical records.

Singapore has similarly started to use technology to transform health care. The Health Ministry has recently launched a mobile application, Singapore Health Marketplace, where nurses are matched to patients at home who need nursing care.

"This allows us to move towards providing medical care beyond the hospital to the community.... For a start, India and Singapore could share our experiences in developing and applying these technologies," Gan said.

Singapore will be participating in the Global Digital Health Summit next month in India and cooperate with India to improve the quality of life, he added.