💰 Economy & FinanceMAINS · GS2.13 · GS3.1

India ranks 10th globally in Medical Value Travel

A Ministry of Tourism backgrounder maps how the "Heal in India" push, the AYUSH Visa and a dedicated promotion board are turning India into a global hub for affordable, holistic healthcare.

What happened

The Ministry of Tourism, through a PIB backgrounder, set out India's standing and policy architecture for Medical Value Travel (MVT) — the cross-border travel of patients for treatment and wellness.
It places India 10th among the top 46 medical tourism destinations on the Medical Tourism Index (MTI) 2020-21, alongside its ranks on global wellness lists.
The flagship branding is the "Heal in India" initiative, which positions the country as a destination for integrated, holistic healthcare blending modern medicine with AYUSH systems.
The note records that 5,07,244 foreign nationals arrived specifically for medical treatment in 2025 — roughly 5.5% of all Foreign Tourist Arrivals (FTAs) that year.
It catalogues the enabling instruments: a dedicated AYUSH Visa (from 27 July 2023), the e-Medical and e-Medical Attendant Visa extended to 172 countries, BIS adoption of ISO 22525, and the National Medical & Wellness Tourism Promotion Board.
The Union Budget 2026-27 proposals it cites — five Regional Medical Hubs, three new All India Institutes of Ayurveda, and an upgrade to the WHO Global Traditional Medicine Centre at Jamnagar — signal the next phase of the build-out.

Background & context

Medical Value Travel sits at the intersection of healthcare, tourism and trade in services. Globally, rising treatment costs, long waiting lists in many developed health systems, and the spread of lifestyle diseases have pushed a growing number of patients to seek care abroad. The backgrounder values the world MVT market at about USD 115.6 billion in 2022, projected to reach roughly USD 286.1 billion by 2030 at a compound annual growth rate near 10.8%. India's own slice is estimated at about USD 8.7 billion in 2025, with a projection of USD 16.2 billion by 2030.

India's appeal rests on a long tradition of healing combined with a large, accredited modern hospital sector and price competitiveness. The note frames the field as two distinct pillars. Medical Tourism covers curative interventions — complex surgeries, organ transplants and advanced diagnostics delivered by specialised hospitals. Wellness Tourism covers preventive and holistic well-being through traditional systems such as Yoga, Ayurveda and Naturopathy. The "Heal in India" branding is the umbrella under which both pillars are marketed to international patients, supported by digital visa facilitation, accreditation, insurance coverage and a national strategy document.

The institutional spine is the National Medical & Wellness Tourism Promotion Board (NMWTB), constituted by the Ministry of Tourism in 2015 and chaired by the Union Minister for Tourism. It provides a dedicated platform to coordinate the many ministries the sector touches — Tourism, Health, AYUSH, Home Affairs (visas), and External Affairs — and the Ministry of Tourism has since formulated a National Strategy and Roadmap for Medical and Wellness Tourism to give the effort direction.

The enabling chain runs across several agencies. The Ministry of Home Affairs administers the visa categories that let patients and their attendants enter — the e-Medical Visa, e-Medical Attendant Visa, and from 2023 the AYUSH Visa and e-AYUSH categories — now open to nationals of 172 countries. The National Accreditation Board for Hospitals and Healthcare Providers (NABH), a constituent board of the Quality Council of India, certifies hospital quality on more than 600 safety parameters; that certification is recognised internationally through the International Society for Quality in Health Care (ISQua), while several Indian hospitals additionally carry Joint Commission International (JCI) accreditation, the global benchmark recognised by foreign patients and insurers. The Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) has adopted ISO 22525, the international standard for medical wellness tourism services, giving the wellness pillar a recognised quality reference. On the financing side, the Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) has, through its health insurance regulations, enabled around 27 insurers to offer over 140 products covering AYUSH treatments — bringing traditional therapies into the formal insurance fold.

Two contextual anchors recur in the backgrounder. The WHO Global Traditional Medicine Centre at Jamnagar, Gujarat, is the World Health Organization's first such centre worldwide, hosted by India, and a Budget proposal would upgrade it. And the wellness pillar leans on India's Yoga diplomacy — the word derives from the Sanskrit root "yuj" (to unite), and the 11th International Day of Yoga in 2025 carried the theme "Yoga for One Earth, One Health," reinforcing the soft-power case for wellness travel.

For Prelims

Flagship initiative: "Heal in India" — the branding for India's Medical Value Travel (MVT) and wellness tourism push.
India's rank (MTI 2020-21): 10th of the top 46 medical tourism destinations; 12th among the world's top 20 wellness tourism markets; 5th among the top 10 wellness destinations in the Asia-Pacific region.
Medical arrivals (2025): 5,07,244 foreign nationals came specifically for treatment — about 5.5% of the 9.15 million total FTAs.
Top source countries (2025): Bangladesh (3,25,127) leads by a wide margin, then Iraq (30,989), Uzbekistan (13,699), Somalia (11,506), Turkmenistan (10,231), Oman (9,738) and Kenya (9,357).
AYUSH expands to: Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy — the six systems under the Ministry of AYUSH that anchor the wellness pillar.
Visa facilitation: a dedicated AYUSH Visa was introduced on 27 July 2023; e-Medical and e-Medical Attendant Visas are extended to nationals of 172 countries; new e-AYUSH and e-AYUSH Attendant categories were added.
Standards & accreditation: BIS has adopted ISO 22525 (medical wellness tourism services); hospitals are accredited by NABH (over 1,299 hospitals on 600+ safety parameters as of 2026), recognised globally through ISQua, with several holding Joint Commission International (JCI) accreditation.
Insurance: under IRDAI health insurance regulations, around 27 insurers now offer more than 140 products covering AYUSH treatments.
Promotion body: National Medical & Wellness Tourism Promotion Board (NMWTB) — set up by the Ministry of Tourism in 2015, chaired by the Union Minister for Tourism.
Budget 2026-27 proposals cited: five Regional Medical Hubs (with States and the private sector), three new All India Institutes of Ayurveda, and an upgrade of the WHO Global Traditional Medicine Centre at Jamnagar, Gujarat.
Healthcare base: India has 69,364 hospitals (43,486 private; 25,778 public) and about 1.2 million registered doctors; tourism contributed 5.22% to GDP in FY24 and supported an estimated 8.46 crore direct and indirect jobs (about 13.3% of total employment).

What it is NOT: "Heal in India" is a Ministry of Tourism branding/initiative, not a statutory mission with a single dedicated outlay, and it is distinct from "Make in India" or "Study in India." The AYUSH Visa is a separate, dedicated visa category — not merely a sub-type of the tourist visa. The Medical Tourism Index is a private/industry ranking framework (where India is 10th of 46), not an official UN or WHO index. The WHO Global Traditional Medicine Centre at Jamnagar is a WHO establishment that India hosts, not an AYUSH-ministry body; and the NMWTB is chaired by the Tourism Minister, not the Health or AYUSH Minister. Wellness tourism (preventive, AYUSH-led) should not be conflated with medical tourism (curative, hospital-led) — the backgrounder treats them as two separate pillars.

For UPSC: India = 10th of 46 on the Medical Tourism Index (2020-21); the build-out rests on three pillars to remember — "Heal in India" branding, the AYUSH Visa (27 July 2023) plus e-Medical Visa to 172 countries, and the NMWTB (Ministry of Tourism, 2015, Tourism-Minister-chaired). AYUSH = Ayurveda, Yoga & Naturopathy, Unani, Siddha, Homeopathy.

Why it matters

MVT is one of the clearest examples of services-sector export potential the syllabus rewards. It earns foreign exchange, generates skilled and semi-skilled jobs across hospitals, hospitality and travel, and showcases two of India's distinctive strengths simultaneously: a cost-competitive, accredited modern hospital network and the soft-power asset of traditional medicine. The combination of price, quality accreditation (NABH, JCI), and the AYUSH wellness offering is what lets India compete with established destinations such as Thailand, Singapore and the UAE.

The backgrounder also reveals the problem the policy must address. India's medical-tourist base is heavily concentrated — Bangladesh alone accounts for the overwhelming majority of arrivals — which makes the inflow vulnerable to bilateral or regional disruption and argues for diversifying source markets. Quality assurance, transparent pricing, patient grievance redress, ethical concerns around organ transplantation and surrogacy, and the equity question of a two-tier health system (premium care for foreign patients while domestic public health remains stretched) are the live debates. The five Regional Medical Hubs and the standardisation push (ISO 22525, NABH expansion) are the policy responses to credibility and capacity concerns.

For Mains

Substantiation

Hard data for the services-export and tourism story: a USD 8.7 bn (2025) market projected to USD 16.2 bn by 2030; 5,07,244 medical arrivals (5.5% of FTAs); tourism at 5.22% of GDP and ~13.3% of employment (FY24). (GS3.1 — economy, growth and employment.)

Exemplification

A concrete case of leveraging traditional knowledge (AYUSH) plus modern infrastructure for inclusive growth and health-sector development; the AYUSH Visa and Jamnagar WHO centre exemplify soft power converted into economic value. (GS2.13 — health, human resources.)

Problematisation

The source's own data exposes the over-concentration risk (one source country dominating arrivals) and the unstated equity tension between a premium MVT segment and an under-resourced public health system — both deployable as critiques.

Way-forward

Diversify source markets, deepen accreditation (NABH/ISO 22525), strengthen patient-protection and ethical safeguards, and use Regional Medical Hubs to spread benefits beyond metro hospitals.

Position

The government's stated stance: "Heal in India" as a coordinated, multi-ministry strategy backed by the NMWTB and a National Strategy and Roadmap.

Deploys into: services-sector export potential and employment (GS3.1); health-sector development and human resources (GS2.13); soft power and traditional knowledge in foreign policy and the economy; and tourism as a driver of inclusive growth.

Ministry of Tourism (PIB Backgrounder) · 2026-05-02 · PRID 2257447 · PIB source ↗

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