The Employees' State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) today decided to extend the coverage of the ESI scheme to the entire country and set up a panel to establish state arms to serve its 2.03 crore insured persons.
"ESIC at its 167th meeting decided to provide services under its Employees' State Insurance (ESI) scheme in the entire country," a source said.
The meeting, which was held today, was chaired by Labour Minister Bandaru Dattatreya.
At present, the ESI scheme is being implemented in industrial or commercial clusters located sparsely in 393 districts in the country. The fact of the matter is that over the years, the coverage has not gone up substantially.
Surveys will be done for all the remaining 271 districts where the ESI scheme has not been implemented so far.
"Initially, ESIC will provide primary care to Insurance Medical Practitioners and secondary and tertiary care through facilities already located with respect to earlier notified pockets of revenue villages in respective districts. Gradually, new dispensaries/hospitals will be developed based on geographical requirements," the source said.
ESIC has also formed a sub-committee to work out modalities to set up a new structure at the state level in which states and the Centre will be duly represented.
It also approved its annual report and accounts for 2014-15 for submission to the central government.
