The National Health Authority on Thursday signed an MoU with the All India Transporters Welfare Association (AITWA) to provide health care services to truck drivers under 'Ayushman Bharat - Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana' (PM-JAY) scheme.Under this partnership, the NHA and AITWA will work together to identify 10 million truck drivers and employees at transport companies who could be eligible beneficiaries for the scheme.The Common Service Centre (CSC) will facilitate the verification of drivers using NHA's Beneficiary Identification System (BIS), a statement said.

A tripartite MoU was signed by Rohit Deo Jha, general manager of the NHA, Mahendra Arya, president of AITWA and a representative fromthe CSC, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology.

"Through this collaboration, thousands of eligiblefamilies will be able to access in-patient care for serious illnesses at acountry-wide network of 19,002 government and private hospitals empanelled under the scheme," the statement said.Drivers can get their AB-PMJAYe-cards issued at the nearest AITWA Highway Hero Centre," it said.In the first phase, pilot projects will be conducted at key locations which will subsequently be rolled out to other towns across the country.Eligible drivers as well as employees, across different transport companies, will be able to avail the benefits of the programme after obtaining the cards.

Officials from the NHA will work closely with a team at AITWA and the CSC for conducting a beneficiary identification drive. Arya highlighted that their partnership with the NHA is a step forward in enabling quality healthcare to transport industry workers and their families.

"The effort to enrol eligible beneficiaries underPM-JAY from the transport industry will truly strengthen the 'Highway Heroesproject', focused on welfare of transport workers," he said.

"The partnership with AITWA is another milestone in ourendeavour to reach the maximum beneficiaries across the country. Thiscollaboration will enable us to further expand our network to provide qualityinpatient care, and we look forward to effectively driving awareness aboutAyushman Bharat PM-JAY among potential beneficiaries," Dr Indu Bhushan,the CEO of AB-PMJAY, said.