Historically India has always had a very large private health sector, especially for ambulatory healthcare services. These include providers of modern medicine as well as traditional practitioners. Hospital services until the mid-seventies were predominantly in the public domain. Medical education was almost a public monopoly until late eighties after which private sector grew rapidly but even today 75 per cent of outturn of medical graduates is from public medical schools. Post mid-seventies the State provided various incentives like concessional land and tax breaks for setting up of private hospitals and duty exemptions for imports. The private pharmaceutical industry also received substantial State patronage for its growth through process patent laws, subsidised bulk drugs from public sector companies and protection from MNCs. 

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