Centre to document medicinal herbs of tribal communities across country

The Centre is working on documenting medicinal herbs and healers of the tribal communities across the country. A pilot from Uttarakhand has been completed, resulting in a five-volume book series of over 1,400 medicinal plants. The exercise, officials said, will be carried out in more states.

The union ministry of tribal affairs carried out the initiative in Kerala, Rajasthan, Maharashtra as well as in Uttarakhand. Apart from documenting the plant and healers, they also documented the Sanskrit names of these plants.

In Kerala, the Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham was given the responsibility, All India Institute of Medical Studies Jodhpur in Rajasthan, Pravara Institute of Medical Sciences Ahmedabad for Maharashtra, and Patanjali carried it out in Uttarakhand.

While the others are carrying it out, Patanjali’s series of seven tomes are ready. In the hill state three districts were chosen, which included Pithoragarh and Udham Singh Nagar, all phytodiversity was documented by a team of over 50-50 people over a period of two years.

When asked about the Sanskrit nomenclature, the official said that it was a way of directing attention to the functionality of the plant.

“The National Medicinal Plant Board says there are over 1,500 plants in Uttarakhand, many of which are not even documented. But in three districts alone, we found 900 plants,” a senior official of the ministry said. “Tribal medicine holds considerable interest among researchers.”

Chemical analysis of all these plants was carried out, to find the active ingredient in the plant, with the help of an HPLC machine, officials said. Apart from that, samples of these were preserved, along with data on their therapeutic use. The official said that permissions from the biodiversity board were also taken.

In addition to that, the Hyderabad-based National Institute of Pharmaceutical Education and Research (NIPER) carried out a similar exercise in their areas where they found three medicinal plants, which when combined can be a cure for malaria. A similar exercise was carried out by the same team in the Rashtrapati Bhawan as well.

Healers in tribal communities in the areas that use these plants were also documented, along with data of their areas of expertise. In all, 750 healers were documented.

Officials said that after the successful pilot, the ministry has sent it to the AYUSH ministry, urging them to take it further across the country using SC/ST components from their funds. Officials also said that details of these plants will be put up online.