Ayushman card eligibility: who qualifies, and the 70-plus rule

The four routes to eligibility

PM-JAY does not take applications on income. A family is either on the list or it is not, and there are four ways onto it: the SECC 2011 base list, a state's own additions, the frontline health-worker inclusion, and the universal 70-plus cover.

The first three are family-based — everyone in an eligible family is covered, with no limit on family size or age. The fourth is individual: a person aged 70 or above qualifies on age alone, whatever the rest of the family's status.

Route 1 — the SECC 2011 base list

Rural families are included if they fall under any of the deprivation criteria of the 2011 census; urban families are included by occupation.

• Rural: households with only one room with kucha walls and roof; no adult member between 16 and 59; female-headed with no adult male member between 16 and 59; a disabled member and no able-bodied adult; SC or ST households; landless households earning mainly from manual casual labour.
• Rural, automatically included: households without shelter, destitute or living on alms, manual scavengers, primitive tribal groups, and legally released bonded labour.
• Urban: households whose main earner works in listed occupations such as rag picking, street vending, domestic work, construction, sanitation, transport, home-based work and similar informal roles.

Routes 2 and 3 — state additions and frontline health workers

• Every implementing state and UT has added beneficiary categories at its own cost, so the list in your state is wider than SECC 2011. The beneficiary portal search reflects your state's list.
• ASHA workers, Anganwadi Workers and Anganwadi Helpers, together with their families, were included in March 2024.

Route 4 — everyone aged 70 and above

On 11 September 2024 the Union Cabinet approved ₹5 lakh cover for every citizen aged 70 or above regardless of income, and the Ayushman Vay Vandana card was launched on 29 October 2024. About 4.5 crore families with 6 crore senior citizens became eligible.

A senior citizen in a family already covered under PM-JAY receives an additional ₹5 lakh top-up for themselves, which they do not share with members below 70. A senior citizen whose family is not otherwise covered receives ₹5 lakh on a family basis. Treatment is available from the day of enrolment — there is no waiting period.