The National Health Authority (NHA), under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, has launched the AB PM-JAY Auto Adjudication Hackathon Showcase 2026 to accelerate the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in healthcare claims management under Ayushman Bharat Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (AB PM-JAY). The two day event was organized in collaboration with the IndiaAI Mission and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru.
Speaking at the event, NHA CEO Dr. Sunil Kumar Barnwal emphasized that robust AI-enabled adjudication systems can significantly improve transparency, efficiency, fraud detection, and programme integrity within India’s largest public health insurance scheme. He stated that AI-based automation will help ensure faster settlements, reduce manual intervention, and build greater trust among empanelled hospitals and beneficiaries.
The showcase featured several advanced AI and machine learning solutions developed to tackle major healthcare claims challenges. These included automated clinical document classification, multilingual OCR for poor quality scans, radiology image validation using AI, and systems designed to detect forged medical documents, ghost beneficiaries, manipulated billing records, and AI-generated deepfake reports.
Officials confirmed that the initiative is part of India’s larger push toward responsible and scalable healthcare AI adoption. Dr. Barnwal also highlighted the BODH platform, an open benchmarking and data platform for Health AI developed at IIT Kanpur, which validates AI systems using India specific healthcare datasets. He noted that India is among the first countries in the Global South to establish such a healthcare AI benchmarking ecosystem.
According to NHA officials, AI-driven adjudication systems are expected to dramatically reduce claim processing timelines. Reports from the Bengaluru showcase revealed that NHA’s in house auto adjudication efforts have already reduced average claim processing time from nearly 20 days to around four hours in certain workflows.
The initiative also aligns with NHA’s broader efforts to strengthen fraud prevention under AB PM-JAY. Earlier reports indicated that technology driven checks and AI systems helped prevent fraudulent healthcare claims worth nearly ₹630 crore over the last two years.
Experts attending the event discussed the future role of Small Language Models (SLMs), Large Language Models (LLMs), multimodal AI systems, privacy safeguards, workflow integration, and scalable deployment strategies in India’s healthcare ecosystem. The government believes such innovations could eventually create a future-ready, transparent, and digitally integrated healthcare claims infrastructure across the country.
“Robust AI-enabled adjudication will enhance transparency, efficiency and programme integrity under AB PM-JAY.”
By
HB Team
