Dinesh Arora

Dinesh Arora (born 23 December 1976) is an Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer, 2002 Kerala cadre, who was former Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s flagship healthcare programme, Ayushman Bharat, in the health ministry and is currently pursuing Masters in Public Health from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health as Sommer Scholar.[1] Prior to this, he was working as the Director at NITI Aayog.[2] He was also worked as an Executive Director, Rural Electrification Corporation (REC) and CEO RECPDCL.

Dinesh Arora
Deputy CEO, Ayushman Bharat, Government of India
Personal details
Born (1976-12-23) 23 December 1976
New Delhi, India
NationalityIndian
ResidencePunjab, India
EducationMBBS, MA (Economics), MPH
Alma materJohns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, London School of Economics, Government Medical College, Chandigarh
OccupationHealth Expert, Indian Administrative Services
As of 27 June, 2019

He was presented with Global HR Excellence Awards 'CEO with HR Orientation'- at World HRD Congress-2016 by Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA).[3][4]

Dr Dinesh Arora is a health expert with 20 years of experience at local, state and federal levels including 15 years of experience in health sector designing / implementing publicly funded health insurance/assurance scheme in India. Credited with revamping the health services in Kerala, a state on the southern tip of India, he was instrumental in initiating a new paradigm of accrediting public hospitals and piloting a widely successful demand driven health insurance scheme. He established the Kerala Medical Services Corporation (KMSCL) and the Food Safety Commissionerate. Later as the Director (Health) NITI (National Institute for Transforming India), he was responsible for the pharma and medical device policy including social health insurance and flagship Aspirational District project. His most recent assignment was as the Deputy CEO National Health Authority, India at the federal level, in which he spearheaded operationalization of the world’s largest publicly funded health insurance scheme. He was responsible for design, implementation, operation and supervision of the scheme including health benefits packages, specifically, cancer care, setting up a robust IT system and facilitating state support for implementation.

He is a physician by training and an Indian administrative service (IAS) Officer by profession. A veracious learner, he has a Diploma in Hospital Administration, Masters in Economics and a Chevening Scholar from London School of Economics (LSE). He is currently pursuing a Master in Public Health (MPH) from the Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University as a Sommer scholar. He has a strong inter-sectoral background with deep understanding of Social welfare sectors including rural electrification, food safety, nutrition projects, water conservation, road safety, school health education programme.

Early life

Dr. Dinesh Arora hails from Chandigarh, Punjab. Arora completed his MBBS in medicine surgery and acquired first division with distinction. He is one of the Indian bureaucrats who clinched five out of 12 berths of Prestigious Chevening Gurukul Scholarship 2011 for Leadership and Excellence, awarded by the British government for a 12-week-long course in London School of Economics and Political Science.[5] He can speak four languages: his mother tongue, Punjabi, Malayalam, Hindi; and English.[6]

Arora loves playing badminton. Recently, in ‘Open Doubles’ category, REC team of Dr. Dinesh Arora and Vijay Behra won Silver Medal at the 20th Inter-Central Power Sector Enterprises Badminton Tournament held under at the aegis of Power Sports Control Board, Power Ministry, Govt. of India, at U Tirot Sing Indoor Stadium, Shillong.[7]

Career

He became an IAS officer in 2002 and was allotted Kerala cadre.[6] Arora has held various positions as Sub-Collector Ottapalam, IT MIssion Director, Collector of Kannur and Thiruvananthapuram, Secretary (Health), State Mission Director - Arogyakeralam, Managing Director - KMSCL and Special Officer Food Safety, Govt. of Kerala.[8] From 2011- 14, he was a private secretary[9] to Former Indian Minister of State for Communications & Information Technology and Shipping, Milind Deora, Government of India.[6]

Deputy Chief Executive Officer, National Health Authority, Government of India (02/2018 – 08/2019)

National Health Authority (NHA) Is the nodal entity of the Government of India for designing and managing the implementation of Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB-PMJAY), the world’s largest publicly funded healthcare scheme.

  • Responsible for developing the overall scheme design including the central elements such as the coverage, target beneficiaries, IT systems, modes of implementation and list of treatments covered under PM-JAY
  • Led the overall supervision of the strategy and operations division at NHA for Ayushman Bharat PM-JAY
  • Supervised multiple facets of the operations including coordination of Central Government with State Governments, formulation of operational guidelines, development of capacity building and information communication frameworks, assessment of strategic purchasing and development of monitoring and anti-fraud mechanisms
  • Responsible along with the CEO, NHA in developing the vision plan for NHA and Ayushman Bharat by identifying key areas of focus and optimizing resource efficiency

Assistant Secretary-General, Medical Council of India, Government of India (02/2019-08/2019)

The Medical Council of India is the nodal institution for managing the function of establishing uniform standards of higher qualifications in medicine and recognition of medical qualifications in India and abroad.

  • Led the revamping process of facilitating technology-centric assessment of Undergraduate / Postgraduate medical colleges to increase accountability and uniformity of assessment
  • Supervised the implementation of the developed process to ensure anonymization of assessments is maintained
  • Responsible in charting out the priorities for the institution, curriculum upgradation and in managing day-to-day operations

Director (Health, Pharmaceuticals & Medical Devices), NITI Aayog, Govt. Of India (06/2017- 07/2018)

NITI (National Institution for Transforming India) Aayog, is the premier policy ‘Think Tank’ of the Government of India, providing both directional and policy inputs.

  • Led the Health vertical overseeing the implementation of National Health Policy including a roadmap for Universal Health coverage with special emphasis on Comprehensive Primary Coverage
  • Designed public-private partnership framework for demand-side financing scheme and non-communicable diseases
  • Implemented SATH (Sustainable Action for Transforming Human capital) program for comprehensive reforms in health, nutrition, and education
  • Led the Voluntary Action Cell (VAC) vertical to institutionalize and monitor the repository of the grants for NGO’s
  • Designed a monitoring plan for grant utilization through a portal ‘NGO Darpan’ to track the spending of 10 million dollars annually to 35,000 NGOs
  • Assisted CEO, NITI Aayog in implementing special projects aimed towards exploring evidence-based policy solutions to environmental pollution and biomass management, detailed report on Delhi’s pollution and monitoring sustainable Development Goals

Mission Director, National Health Mission, Health and Family Welfare, Government of Kerala (06/2006-06/2011)
  • Responsible for implementing all the National Health Programmes and RSBY (Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana) in Kerala which witnessed the state being awarded three shields for outstanding performance.
  • Led emergency management activities for Chicken Gunya outbreak in Kerala in 2006, preventing H1N1 Influenza outbreak during Sabarimala pilgrimage season in 2009 with nearly 50 lac pilgrims
  • Supervised the process of service optimization for 40,000 strong health staff in filling up critical gaps of human power, infrastructure, and drugs. Pioneered compulsory rural service for all doctors, restructured nursing cadre
  • Developed IT based online reporting and monitoring which was adopted by the Government of India as HMIS – Hospital based Monitoring Information Syste
  • Developed an E-Banking system from end to end for all financial transactions in the Health programs.
  • Founder managing director for Kerala Medical Services Corporation. Led the procurement process amounting US100$ million worth drugs and piloted 20 innovations in healthcare across the state
  • Special Officer for Thiruvananthapuram and Calicut Medical colleges for their upgradation and excellence.
  • Set up new quality paradigm for public hospitals and championed 7 Public Hospitals with NABH Accreditation.

Sub Collector, Palakkad District, Government of Kerala (2004-2006)
  • Headed administration of the Palakkad town with a population of 1 million.
  • Head of the sub-division public hospitals and upgradation of public health infrastructure.
  • As Managing Director of Attapady co-operative farming society, instrumental in setting up medical facilities in the tribal belt of Attapady, Palakkad.

Intersectoral experiences: (2011-2017)

Major influences that shape the health of populations and the distribution of health inequities are located outside the health sector. The fact that most of these influences lie outside of the exclusive jurisdiction of the health sector, requires the health sector to engage with other sectors of government and society to address the determinants of health and well- being. I spearheaded the Rural Electrification programme in India with a projected expenditure of USD 11 Bn Capital to provide electricity access to 6 lakh villages. This led to higher immunization, health facilities and functional blood banks in the rural areas. As Director of social welfare, streamlined the Anaganwadi network in Kerala for supplemental food distribution to pregnant mothers and preschool children. As District Collector Thiruvanthapuram, worked on the road safety programme especially the school bus safety. Also institutionalized school health programmes implementation in Kerala including mandatory health check-ups. As advisor to Minister of IT, pioneered Health telemedicine projects across the country including building IT backbone for cancer care consultation and health information systems.

Crackdown against illegal sand mining

Serving as the Ottappalan Sub-Collector, Arora took stern action against illegal sand-mining in the Bharathapuzha at Ottapalam, Pattambi, Thrithala, and Thiruvanthapuram.[10] The illegal mining of sand was carried out indiscriminately using covert means from ‘kadavus' in the capital district in Kerala. No ‘kadavus' have been approved and no passes have been issued by geologists. In spite of various directions and court orders, the law enforcement agencies had failed to control this illegal activity.[11] Quoting Shri Arora, The Hindu newspaper mentioned the local bodies that were auctioning sand had failed to stop illegal sand-mining, which had resulted in the destruction of the river.[12]

Strict rules for students’ road safety in Kerala

His campaign in Kerala to ensure that schools comply with safety regulations is highly praised. He took the charge to inforce various safety measures viz. display ‘On school duty' boards on autorickshaws, cars, mini-vans and other hired while transporting students. He also mandated maximum carriage capacity for Autorickshaws, 10 years of driving experience and an EIB driving permit for the drivers. He made it mandatory for school buses to have a fire extinguisher, first-aid box, well-fortified windows, lockable doors and emergency exits. Arora also ordered Regional Transport Officers (RTOs) to impound student carriers violating safety norms after April 1, 2011 and to prosecute their drivers and registered owners.[13]

Ban on illegal mining operations in the quarries in Thiruvananthapuram

Acting as a District Collector and District Magistrate, Dr. Arora banned all the blasting operations leading to illegal and unscientific cutting in the quarries in Thiruvananthapuram to ensure the health and safety of the people. This was followed by constitution of a committee headed by the Additional District Magistrate along the District Geologist and the District Officer of the Kerala State Pollution Control Board (PCB) as members to carry out a safety audit of mining operations in the 181 quarries in the district.[14]

Ensured free and fair polling at Kannur

Arora made the polling at Kannur district in Kerala free and fair by deploying 150 videographers at sensitive booths, all trained to capture critical events on election day, like sealing of electronic voting machines (EVMs), positioning of voting compartments, polling agents, voters waiting in queue at the close of scheduled hour and the last voter in queue, visits of sector officers, the observers and other electoral functionaries. Kannur, otherwise has been one of the most difficult poll pavements during elections.[15]

Formulation of strict guidelines for parading of elephants

In the midst of growing dissonance between Kerala's captive elephants and the mobile-toting population,[16] Dr. Dinesh Arora (the then District Collector of Thiruvananthapuram) formulated a new set of regulations after a district-level meeting to prevent cruelty to elephants under the Kerala Captive Elephants (Management and Maintenance) Rules 2003.[17] The regulations came into effect from May 1, 2011 and it demanded organisers of celebrations using elephants to seek permission from the District Forest Officer, two weeks in advance. The DFO is now required to submit a copy of the permit to the Collector. This permit is based on a certificate issued by the Forest Veterinary Officer or the veterinary surgeon of the Elephant Squad. The DFO has to inspect the mahout's certificate, movement register and other documents to ensure that the elephant to be paraded is free of musth, diseases, injuries and signs of pregnancy, before issuing a permit.

Health Initiatives

As State Mission Director, Arogyakeralam of National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), Govt. of Kerala, Arora under took a Rapid Assessment to explore the overall reach as well as the performance of the Radio Health FM programme in Thiruvananthapuram in disseminating health promotion among the public.[18]

Providing transparency in rural electrification

Dinesh Arora, who heads the efforts of Government of India in rural electrification has played an instrumental role in formulating the 'Garv App' and also setting up of institutional mechanism of Gram Vidyut abhiyanta. The Garv App was formally unveiled by Power Minister Piyush Goyal in March 2016.[19] The mobile app enables GVAs to update photographs of the electrical infrastructure along with GPS coordinates during their visit for monitoring the progress of electrification and map it with pre-defined milestones. As most of the unelectrified villages lack proper network connectivity, so it has been ensured that data can also be captured in ‘offline mode’ and get synced with the server after returning to network area. The mobile app provides a dashboard, which gives an overview of the electrification status of the 18,452 un-electrified villages of the country. It displays the number of milestones achieved, status of the progress state-wise, district-wise and village-wise. One can even track the names of contractors implementing the projects in any un-electrified village, date of award of project at the village level, number of villages visited till date by GVAs, visits undertaken in last seven days, villages electrified in past four weeks etc.[20][21]

Recently, Piyush Goyal during the launch of 'GARV' newsletter for rural electrification felicitated REC executive director Dinesh Arora for achieving one-third of the rural electrification target by electrifying more than 6,000 villages across the country.[22]

Honors and Awards
  1. International “Open Award” for IT Systems in PMJAY (2018) - Best practices in IT in terms of scale of implementation, security, privacy in Health
  2. National E-Governance Award (2016) - Gold Category for the Mission Village Electrification | Department of Administrative Reforms
  3. Best Implementing State of National Health Insurance Scheme (2008-10) - RSBY Implementation | Government of India
  4. Director General’s Gold Medal (2002) - Probation/Training | Indian Administrative Service
gollark: I did say "resulting in inability to finish", though, and if a human took over after a loop happened it could be finished.
gollark: Yes, fine, no finite path.
gollark: As far as I know, there is no path resulting in inability to finish.
gollark: Basically, you're invincible in this.
gollark: NOOOOOOOO!

References
  1. "NITI Aayog official appointed PM's healthcare programme director". Retrieved 2018-02-23.
  2. "Dr Dinesh Arora appointed Director of NITI Aayog". Delhi, India. 2017-08-16. Retrieved 2017-09-05.
  3. "Dr. Dinesh Arora awarded at World HRD Congress-2016". Delhi, India. 2016-02-25. Retrieved 2016-04-30.
  4. "CEO-REC Power Distribution Company Ltd, felicitated with prestigious 'CEO with HR Orientation' Award" (PDF). Delhi, India. 2016-02-15. Retrieved 2016-04-30.
  5. "Chevening Gurukul Scholarship 2011". Retrieved 2013-10-07.
  6. "The Economic Times". Delhi, India. 2018-10-14. Retrieved 2018-10-14.
  7. "REC wins Medals at Inter-CPSU Badminton Tournament". Delhi, India. 2016-03-21. Archived from the original on 2016-06-10. Retrieved 2016-04-30.
  8. "Bureaucracy India, Govt. of India, Government of India, Ministry, Bureaucrat, Bureaucracy in India". Archived from the original on 2013-02-18. Retrieved 2013-07-03.
  9. "Posting Details". Archived from the original on 2013-08-13. Retrieved 2013-10-07.
  10. "The Hindu : Kerala News : Curbs on sand-mining in Bharathapuzha". Chennai, India. 2005-01-07. Retrieved 2013-07-03.
  11. Reporter, taff (2011-03-11). "Steps to check illegal sand-mining - The Hindu". Chennai, India. Retrieved 2013-07-03.
  12. "The Hindu : Kerala / Palakkad News : Right to mine sand from October to be auctioned". Chennai, India. 2005-06-06. Retrieved 2013-07-03.
  13. Anand, G. (2011-03-14). "Safety regulations: directive to schools - The Hindu". Chennai, India. Retrieved 2013-07-03.
  14. Radhakrishnan, S. Anil (2011-06-13). "Safety audit to be held in quarries - The Hindu". Chennai, India. Retrieved 2013-09-21.
  15. "Poll process to be videographed - The Hindu". Chennai, India. 2009-04-16. Retrieved 2013-09-21.
  16. "A Mammoth Problem". Retrieved 2013-09-27.
  17. "The Hindu : Kerala / Thiruvananthapuram News : Collector issues norms for using elephants for fetes". Chennai, India. 2011-04-28. Retrieved 2013-09-27.
  18. "Rapid Assessment of Radio Health FM Programme in Thiruvananthapuram" (PDF). Retrieved 2014-12-12.
  19. "Goyal unveils app to monitor in real time demand and supply of power". Delhi, India. 2016-03-31. Retrieved 2016-04-30.
  20. "Technology for transparency in rural electrification". Delhi, India. 2016-04-11. Retrieved 2016-04-30.
  21. "Technology for transparency in rural electrification". Delhi, India. 2016-03-29. Retrieved 2016-04-30.
  22. "'Transmission cos to gain from depreciation clause'". Delhi, India. 2016-03-03. Retrieved 2016-04-30.
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