With the vision of 'Make in India' and 'Atmanirbhar Bharat', India has an opportunity to become a world leader in health tech, said experts on 4 June.

In the last five years, India has seen tremendous growth in robotic surgery, Chairman and CEO of SS Innovations in India, said, noting that "robotic surgery will be the future".

He attributed the increased adoption to patients accepting the procedures because of faster recovery, shorter hospital stays, and reduced risk of post-surgery infections.

The company has produced the first and only indigenous mantra robotic system that is advanced and affordable. "India truly has an opportunity to become a world leader especially when the system is affordable.

It is a model for many countries that even in a developing economy and a very large population base, such things can be accomplished," he said. Sabine Kapasi, a gynaecologist and a public health professional also called for increasing focus on public health infrastructure, especially in the rural spaces and primary health systems.

"This focus should be towards tech enablement for some of these primary and community wellness exercises, where we add devices, IoT networks, as well as software systems, which today act to build better wellness for the public at large," she said.

Continuous electronic health records as well as personalised, secure solutions in healthcare are going to be the framework in digital public infrastructure that all of the solutions are built around, said Dr. Sabine, also the managing director of Enira Consulting.

The expert called for upskilling of ASHA workers and also for increasing the size of the frontline healthcare workforce, which includes nurses.

Chairman of, the Medical Technology Association of India (MTaI) lauded the government for harnessing both the global and the local currents optimally in the medtech sector.

"Make in India is advancing and so is India's seamless integration with the global supply chains. FDI came on an automatic route, all previous FDI records were broken, and PLI and PRIP schemes took off. The government's commitment to French shoring has also attracted cutting-edge technologies and has boosted employment opportunities," he said.