Jun 08 2026 to Jun 08 2026 6:30 p.m.

Where

Bangalore International Centre

7 4th Main Rd, Stage 2, Domlur 560071

Event Description

In January 2026, The Lancet published a landmark report by the Lancet Commission on a citizen-centred health system for India — the result of five years of work begun at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The report argues that advances in biotechnology, artificial intelligence, and digital public infrastructure together create a historic opportunity to achieve universal health coverage in India, drawing almost entirely on domestic resources. From vaccine manufacturing to pandemic-tracking platforms, India’s own capabilities are the foundation of the Commission’s vision.

Dr. Nachiket Mor, commissioner and key author, will present an overview of the report. He will be joined by Dr. Kiran Mazumdar Shaw, co-Chair of the Commission; Ms. Uma Mahadevan IAS, Additional Chief Secretary and Development Commissioner, Government of Karnataka; and Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, Chair of the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, for a panel discussion moderated by Professor Vijay Chandru, commissioner and co-chair of the report’s technology workstream. The discussion will open to audience questions.

Speakers

Nachiket Mor
Economist & Health Systems Researcher
Nachiket Mor, PhD, is an economist and health-systems researcher based in Bengaluru, with a long-standing interest in how finance, technology, regulation, and institutional design can be brought together to build more effective public systems. He is a Visiting Scientist at the Banyan Academy of Leadership in Mental Health and a Visiting Professor at the Indian School of Business. He was a Commissioner on The Lancet Commission on a Citizen-Centred Health System for India, chaired its healthcare finance workstream, and was one of the core authors of its recent report. His work has spanned health financing, digital public infrastructure, technology-enabled care models, primary care, health insurance, and health-system governance. He has served on the Central Board of the Reserve Bank of India, was a member of the Ministry of Finance’s Technology Advisory Group for Unique Projects, and is currently associated with several health-sector institutions, including Narayana Hrudayalaya, the National Cancer Grid Centre for Digital Health, and the Indian Paediatric Haematology Oncology Group.

Kiran Mazumdar Shaw
Entrepreneur & Philantrophist
A pioneer of the biotechnology industry in India and the head of the country’s leading biotechnology enterprise, Biocon, Ms. Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw is a highly respected businesswoman, committed to innovation and affordability in delivering world-class therapeutics to patients globally. She has been recognized with the Padma Shri (1989) and the Padma Bhushan (2005).

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw is the Chairperson and Managing Director of Biocon, Asia’s leading bio-pharmaceuticals enterprise. Named among TIME magazine’s 100 most influential people in the world, she is recognized as a global thought leader for Biotechnology. Under her stewardship, Biocon has evolved since its inception in 1978 from an industrial enzymes company to a fully-integrated, innovation-led, emerging global biopharmaceutical enterprise committed to reduce therapy costs of chronic conditions like diabetes, cancer and autoimmune diseases.

As a global influencer, she is ranked among ‘World’s 25 Most Influential People in Biopharma’ by Fierce Biotech, Forbes magazine’s ‘World’s 100 Most Powerful Women’ and Fortune’s ‘Top 25 Most Powerful Women in Asia-Pacific.’ She has been recognized as the only Indian on Forbes’ list of ‘World’s Self-Made Women Billionaires.’ She has been featured in ‘The Worldview 100 List’ of the most influential visionaries by Scientific American magazine and named among the ‘100 Leading Global Thinkers’ by Foreign Policy magazine. She has ranked No. 1 in the Business Captains category on ‘Medicine Maker Power List’ 2018, an index of the 100 most influential people across the globe in the field of medicine, where she has been among the Top 10, consecutively since 2015. Most recently, she is elected as a full-term member of the Board of Trustees of The MIT Corporation, USA.

Uma Mahadevan
Additional Chief Secretary & Development Commissioner, Government of Karnataka
Uma Mahadevan is in the IAS, currently Additional Chief Secretary & Development Commissioner, Government of Karnataka. She has worked in important sectors at the central and the state, including Women & Child Development, Skill Development and Livelihoods, Planning, Agriculture, Education and Health. She has also served in the Department of Atomic Energy, Government of India. She was a member of the working group that prepared Karnataka’s first Human Development Report. She has also been a member of the ECCE Taskforce, Government of India. She writes on development and culture.

Soumya Swaminathan
Former Chief Scientist, WHO
Soumya Swaminathan was most recently WHO’s Chief Scientist and before that, Deputy Director-General for Programmes. Returning to India, she took over as Chairperson of the M S Swaminathan Research Foundation (MSSRF) in February 2023.

A paediatrician from India and a globally recognised researcher on tuberculosis and HIV, she brings with her 30 years of experience in clinical care and research and has worked throughout her career to translate research into impactful programmes. Dr. Swaminathan was Secretary to the Government of India for Health Research and Director General of the Indian Council of Medical Research from 2015 to 2017.

She is a Board Member of the Alliance Bioversity, Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), FIND, Population Foundation of India and others. She is also a Governing Council Member of the Tamil Nadu Climate Change Mission and Chair of ICMR’s Scientific Advisory Board.

Vijay Chandru
Advisor, CBR & ARTPark, IISc, Hoodi Strategy Group & NCBS
Vijay Chandru is on the faculty and an advisor to the CBR and ARTPark at IISc, the Hoodi Strategy Group and NCBS in Bangalore. A fellow of several Indian and global academies of science and engineering, he has been an inventor, innovator and entrepreneur. The Simputer, Strand Life Sciences, Yantri Labs and CrisprBits are some of his contributions in the deep science entrepreneurial ecosystem of Bangalore over the last 25 years. He also has made research contributions in digital health related to computational epidemiology, climate science and work with rare genetic disorders. A distinguished alumnus of BITS Pilani and MIT-Cambridge, his work has been recognized with awards from MEITY, University Grants Commission, World Economic Forum, and several professional fora. His work since retirement is with civil society foundations that are dedicated to health policy, open data for public good and healthcare access for underserved communities.