Union Budget 2026: Finance Minister Sitharaman announces NIMHANS in North India, healthcare boost

New Delhi: With a rising mental healthcare burden, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Sunday announced establishing a mental healthcare hospital like NIMHANS in north India, expanding trauma care facilities in district hospitals and strengthening the paramedical workforce to boost the healthcare sector.

The Finance Minister also proposed to exempt 17 anti-cancer drugs from basic customs duty and doing away with duties on personal import of “drugs, medicines and food for special medical purposes” for seven more rare diseases.

“There are no national institutes for mental healthcare in north India. We will therefore set up a NIMHANS-2 and also upgrade National Mental Health Institutes in Ranchi and Tezpur as regional apex institutions,” she said.

The announcements on new mental health facilities come at a time when an official survey shows that 10.6 per cent of Indian adults – roughly 11 out of every 100 adults – were living with a diagnosable mental health disorder.

According to the 2015-16 National Mental Health Survey conducted by the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bengaluru, 15 per cent of India’s adult population experiences mental health issues requiring intervention.

The overall allocation for the Union Health Ministry is pegged at Rs 1,06,530 crore that is nearly 7 per cent more than last year’s budgetary estimate of Rs 99,858 crore.

With the country’s disease burden shifting towards non-communicable diseases like cancer, diabetes and autoimmune disorders, she proposed a Rs 10,000 crore Biopharma SHAKTI (Strategy for Healthcare Advancement through Knowledge, Technology and Innovation) initiative to build an ecosystem for domestic production of biologics and biosimilars in the next five years.

The strategy will include a biopharma-focused network with three new National Institutes of Pharmaceutical Education and Research and upgrading seven existing ones. It will also create a network of over 1000 accredited India Clinical Trials sites.

“We propose to strengthen the Central Drugs Standard Control Organisation to meet global standards and approval time frames through a dedicated scientific review cadre and specialists,” she said, suggesting a review of the standards followed by the Indian drug regulator.

Flagging how emergencies expose families, particularly the poor and vulnerable, to unexpected expenditure, the Finance Minister said the Centre would strengthen and increase such capacities by 50 per cent in district hospitals by establishing Emergency and Trauma Care Centres.

On boosting the strength of paramedical workforce, she said existing institutions for Allied Health Professionals (AHPs) would be upgraded and new AHP Institutions would be set up in private and government sectors.

This will cover 10 selected disciplines, including optometry, radiology, anesthesia, OT technology, applied psychology and behavioural health and add 100,000 AHPs in the next five years.

The Finance Minister has also proposed to set up three new All India Institutes of Ayurveda; upgrade AYUSH pharmacies and drug testing labs for higher standards of certification ecosystem, and upgrade the WHO Global Traditional Medicine Centre at Jamnagar to bolster evidence-based research and training.

She also proposed a scheme to support states in establishing five regional medical hubs, in partnership with the private sector to promote India as a hub for medical tourism services.