Traditional Knowledge in Modern India by Nirmal Sengupta

Author:Nirmal Sengupta
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9788132239222
Publisher: Springer India

4.2 A Holistic Approach—FRLHT

The 1985 paper of Farnsworth and Soejarto warned that by 2000 AD several billion dollars per year worth of medicinal plants would be extinct. This had created worldwide a sense of urgency to preserve the valuable heritage . In India too, several experimental efforts to preserve the plant resources used in traditional medicines began at different levels. One such effort was by Darshan Shankar , a statistics graduate, later seen as a civil society activist with twelve years experience of social work in a tribal block in Maharashtra. During this work, he noted that traditional medicinal systems were still functional and were used regularly by a vast number of tribal people for primary health care . Nor were they worthless. One of his colleagues suffering from severe jaundice was promptly cured by a local medicine man. Darshan began to inquire whether there ever was any effort to validate these remedies. Scientists in reputed institutions whom he approached informed him that in a few cases the chemistry of a plant or the biological activity of a compound was studied. But there was no clinical data on the application of these materials. The massive investment required for validation of this kind of knowledge was not forthcoming (Darshan Shankar 2001). Around this time, he was invited to join Lok Swasthya Parampara Samvardhan Samiti (LSPSS) as its Honorary Executive Chairman. LSPSS, established in 1984, was a network of individuals and organizations involved in strengthening traditional systems of medicine, particularly the non-institutionalized or folk traditions (lok parampara). The network was organizing training programs for folk healers, holding conventions of Vaidyas at the community level, and producing publications. LSPSS brought out several important monographs on Ayurvedic principles of food and nutrition and local health traditions. Soon the network structure appeared to be inadequate for pursuing the work of revitalization of Indian medical traditions. In 1991, LSPSS transformed itself into Foundation for Revitalisation of Local Health Traditions (FRLHT), a registered public trust located in Bangalore (Unnikrishnan and Hariramamurthi 2012) . Sam Pitroda, then heading the Technology Missions, became the Chairman and Darshan Shankar the Director of FRLHT. FRLHT identified that three different types of tasks need to be done for a revitalization mission. These are:1. Conservation of natural resources used by Indian systems of medicine.

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