The Uttar Pradesh government has called off plans to involve major hospital chains, including Apollo Hospitals, Fortis Heathcare, Max Healthcare and Rockland, to revive its district-level health centres.

The state government announced the termination on Thursday. The decision was conveyed in a press release by the state information department. Chief minister Mayawati said it has been decided that government hospitals would not be handed over to the private sector. Instead, she has directed department heads to ensure better functioning and strengthening of these hospitals.

The government?s initiative to hand over the district-level public healthcare service infrastructure to the private sector was envisioned under the public-private partnership model.

While no reason was given for the rollback of the decision ? which had promised to provide a cutting-edge, integrated healthcare delivery system with international standard benchmarking and patient-centric approach right up to the village level ? it is being seen as a regressive step.

It is felt that besides making the government appear apologetic, it will also impact all other PPP projects lined up by the state government. The state had planned to transfer operations of four district hospitals, eight community centres, 23 primary health centres and 210 sub-centres in the four districts of Allahabad, Ferozabad, Basti and Kanpur Nagar to the private sector. The prospect of managing healthcare in the hinterland appealed so much to the private sector that all the big names in private healthcare turned up at the three pre-bid meetings and submitted requests for proposals.

Experts tracking PPP initiatives feel that with this single decision, the government has undone all the good work it has done on the PPP front in various sectors in the last three years. ?Investors had shown interest in many of the state?s projects after years of persuasive efforts to wean off the anti-industry tag and by offering loads of incentives. They will again feel let down by this order and will dither in putting money into the state,? said the member of a leading industry chamber.

An official of the state medical and healthcare department said: ?This would not only question the credibility of the state government on its own policies, but would also take the wind out of all efforts which have been put into other projects so far.?

This is, however, not the first time the state government has developed cold feet after announcing a radical policy. Earlier, the government had rolled back its path-breaking agricultural policy ? which threw open the farm sector to the private sector and introduced contract farming in 2007 ? retracted the highly commendable and transparent e-procurement policy in 2010 and ordered the closure of Reliance Fresh stores barely 24 hours after they were opened in 2007. In fact, the decision on Reliance Fresh stores resulted in Mukesh Ambani shelving plans to invest about Rs 10,000 crore in the state.