This article provides evidence on the impact of the Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojana on access to healthcare and financial risk protection; its coverage across selected states and whether the targeting is effective. Overall, just about 11% of households were enrolled and almost half of these households actually belonged to the non-poor category. Although the scheme has increased hospitalisation rate, we do not know if it has enabled people to access the “genuinely needed” inpatient care which they could not afford earlier or whether hospitals are inducing the demand by suggesting unnecessary inpatient care to the people. Disturbingly, it has hardly had any effects on financial protection. These evidences unequivocally indicate that targeted health insurance coupled with a healthcare delivery system dominated by private providers cannot be the means to achieve universal healthcare.
